The Hot Trail
by NellyN
Summary: Three years after master con man Neal Caffrey's final goodbye, a man with no identity is arrested at the Mexican border. He will only speak to FBI Agent Peter Burke. It's a call Peter has been hoping for but never expected to get. But what Peter learns in El Paso has ramifications far beyond White Collar. The race is on to save Manhattan.
1. Chapter 1

There was a problem with the printer.

There were many problems with the printer. The army caught him in Namibia. The corrupt army captain had planned to harness the the printer's skills for his own benefit, and begin amassing an empire against his rival, but the captain also had keen and accurate instincts. He knew there was something wrong when you put the barrel of a gun against a man's knee and didn't see any reaction in his eyes. The printer had the face of someone who had all the goods on you. Someone who knew _everything_. Things you didn't want to know. The printer also rubbed off his fingerprints. This was not the kind of person you wanted printing your money and passports. This was the kind of person who eventually ran away with all your money and passports.

So the captain sold the printer to his rival at an extortionist price, but the rival became suspicious that the captain would let such a valuable property go. So he sold the printer at an even higher markup to human traffickers who specialized in moving skilled talent up the river: Egypt, Israel, the Levant. There were days trapped in hot shipping containers with scared young Asian girls. There were nights lost to seasickness and scopolamine, when he was locked in the hold of a ship with a pile of surface-to-air missiles. The Russian crew of the ship liked the printer. The printer was funny, good at cards, and could hold his liquor. By the time the ship docked in Greece, the Russians had also learned of the printer's value and reputation. Instead of letting him move on to his intended destination they, too, sold him off, to the Uzbek buyers of the missiles. (It was months before the Uzbeks realized that each one of their more lethal purchases had suffered exactly the same mechanical failure. The blame fell on the Russians, who ought to have known better.)

At that point the printer, whose skills were so valuable and so necessary and so attractive, had been a captive for something like two months, and in that time he had not printed a single American dollar or forged a single visa. You couldn't blame the Belgians for suspecting the entire thing was a scam. A very angry Belgian man nearly cut off the printer's little fingertip with a cigar trimmer. But then the printer slipped him a newly minted gold Krugerrand and nobody could figure out whether it was a forgery or not, not even clever little Baudelaire, the house printer. Fake or real, the Krugerrand was a pretty good trick, and the Belgians made the same deduction as each of the ones who had come before: the printer was too valuable to kill and too dangerous to keep around. They upped the price and made some phone calls. The printer was moved west, for the price of almost six million dollars.

Unusually for him, the printer was running no kind of scam. He was broke, exhausted, suffering a cold and actually quite frightened. Soon he found himself shipped south again, and across another sea. He spent a fortnight in Havana among a gang of drug dealers with more money than good sense, who eventually tired of him not being able to speak Spanish (the printer did speak Spanish of both the South American and European varieties but elected not to employ that skill after getting a sense of the level of discourse). The Venezuelans bought him at a markdown and the printer began to wonder if he was being used to launder money. The idea insulted his vanity but flattered his intelligence and sense of narrative: he wondered if, like a fine stolen painting, his very _existence_ become an untraceable item of value. An underground currency. The irony of the idea was not lost on him.

From the oil state the road ran north, of course, and north, and north, and finally the printer found himself at _the_ border. He was a passenger in a truck that was gravid with cocaine, and he happened to know that the street value of the drugs and his own street value were about equal.

The printer decided that it was high time for his journey to come to a close. While his Mexican captor's back was turned, the printer took a small vial of ipecac from the heel of his shoe. He took a deep breath—the next few days would be deeply unpleasant, and the next few hours worst of all—and downed the entire contents. By the time they reached the checkpoint, his head was swimming and his stomach was churning, and he was drenched in a cold sweat. The border guards had been handsomely bribed, but when the printer vomited all over the windshield and dashboard, calculations changed.

"Shut... the fuck... up..." growled the Mexican driver.

The printer put his hand on his stomach and moaned. "I'm s-ss—sick." He vomited again. "Ate... something..."

"I _will_ kill you."

"Please," begged the printer, who was beginning to feel like he was going to die anyway. The driver couldn't exactly execute him two feet from the border checkpoint, or throw him out of the car, and the printer sure as hell wasn't going to stop projectile vomiting anytime soon. "I knew..." the printer gasped. "I knew I should've skipped the guacamole." He heaved again.

"Jesucristo," said the Mexican driver.

A badge slapped up against the driver's side window. "Border Patrol. Would you mind stepping out of the vehicle?"

The printer grasped his temples to hide his reaction. It had been months since he'd heard an American accent, and longer than that since he had heard an American cop talk. His eyes brimmed with tears. He never thought he'd miss that. His stomach clamped down again and he moaned. "Is it Christmas?" he asked in English.

"What?" said the Mexican driver.

"Sir, you need to step _out_ of the vehicle. Salir del vehículo, ahora, rápido."

The passenger side door opened and the printer fell out.

#

The printer said nothing. He was locked in a cold and bare room with a cot and a toilet and spent the next several hours getting to know the toilet intimately, and a few more hours sleeping it off. When they found out he had no fingerprints, the border patrol guys got very _upset_ , but the printer still said nothing. They tried to intimidate him and cajole him. They tried in English, Spanish, French, Arabic, and even sign language, but the printer was silent. First men with dark uniforms tried to get a statement. Then men in white uniforms. Then men in very cheap suits, and finally men in mediocre suits. Things being what they were, they couldn't release a detainee with a thick bushy beard, a farmer's tan and no identity, but they couldn't charge him with a crime either. He hadn't actually crossed the border. We want a name, they said. All we want is a name. The bad cops said, We will deport you to Gitmo. We will drop you in the desert to rot. The good cops said, We will give you asylum. If you're in trouble, we can help you.

Just give us a name.

The printer held his tongue and watched the clock. The brighter agents and interrogators got the same sense as several captors before them. This guy was here for a reason and could walk whenever he wanted. It did not make them more inclined to release him. Finally, when it was 10:00 a.m. in El Paso and noon in Manhattan, on the second day of his detention, the printer snatched a Sharpie from the pocket of his interrogator. They didn't have pencil and paper and he didn't feel like asking them for anything. Asking implied an exchange. He wrote four words on the table.

The interrogator bent over it. "What the hell does this mean?"

The printer shrugged in a way that said: _you figure it out, pal._

The interrogator pointed. "Is this you? Is this your name?"

The printer shook his head.

"What's it say?" asked the door guard.

"Peter Burke," read the interrogator. "White Collar."

The printer leaned back and folded his arms.

The door guard sighed. "Weirdo."

"Maybe," said the interrogator.

#

When the call came at 12:22, Elizabeth Burke was just about to dig in to some beef and broccoli. She was sitting across the desk from her husband in the Manhattan offices of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Once or twice a week, Elizabeth left work to share lunch with Peter at White Collar. Usually they'd talk about her events, his cases, the movies they wanted to see, the places they wanted to visit someday, and which walls of the house they'd like to knock out. It was one of Elizabeth's favorite things to do. That day things were a little more serious than usual: their son Neal, only three, was going to have to have tubes put in his ears. Elizabeth would just be glad to see their boy healed of a chronic ear infection; Peter had pulled up the list of side effects.

"I'm not saying we shouldn't do it," said Peter. He pinched one of her wontons from the box before sliding it across to her. "I'm just saying that it's surgery and all surgeries have risks."

"You don't think ear infections have risks?"

"I know they do, hon," said Peter, dipping a crispy noodle in red sauce. "He's just so little."

"It takes less than ten minutes," said Elizabeth. "He'll be fine. He's a tough kid."

"I don't want him to _have_ _to_ be tough. Have you looked at the risks of the anesthesia drugs?"

"I don't want him to be in pain anymore," said Elizabeth. "The appointment is Friday afternoon."

Peter grimaced. "I'm supposed to be in court."

"All day?"

"Well, maybe I can—"

That was when Peter's desk phone rang. He looked at it for a moment as if suddenly remembering the existence of desks and phones and a universe that was not concerned with the tender problems of the Burke family.

"Take it," said Elizabeth.

Peter picked up the phone. "This is Burke." There was a long silence, and then something happened to Peter. He went white and reached across the table, casting for Elizabeth's hand. When he found it he slipped his fingers in between hers and held them tightly.

"What?" For a moment Elizabeth was terrified that something had happened to Neal, but in that case the nanny would call her cell phone. This was something else. "Honey, what?"

Peter shook his head at her. "I'm sorry." His voice was hoarse. "You'll have to repeat that."

"You're frightening me," said Elizabeth.

Peter nodded. "Okay," he said into the phone. "I'll be on the first flight out."

He hung up. He looked at Elizabeth. He looked at his desk. He looked out through the glass wall at White Collar. His gaze caught on Neal Caffrey's old desk, now occupied by a probie whom Peter did not like.

"You look like you've just seen a ghost," said Elizabeth.

"I need to go to El Paso," Peter murmured.

She blinked. "Texas?"

Peter Burke stood up and walked out to the balcony outside his office, which overlooked the White Collar bullpen. Down there, ten special agents ensured that Wall Street kept its hands out of the till and authentic fine art stayed on the walls of Manhattan's museums. Elizabeth didn't know whether to follow him or stay put. If something had happened to one of Peter's agents, this place would be turned inside out in a minute, and so would her husband. "Listen up. I need to be in El Paso, Texas," Peter bellowed. "And I mean _right now._ I don't care if you have to charter a plane. Spend whatever you need to spend. Yesterday's too late."

A loyal chorus of _on it, boss_ came from the staff below.

Peter came back in, but this time he didn't sit in the chair behind his desk. He sat beside Elizabeth and took her hands in his. His hands were shaking. He took a deep breath. "El," he said. "Two days ago a man was arrested at the border."

"Fine," said Elizabeth.

"He doesn't have any fingerprints and he hasn't made a statement."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean they've been holding this guy for thirty-six hours and they have no idea who he is."

"So?"

"He asked for me. By name. El—"

"He knows you."

Peter nodded.

"Honey," said Elizabeth, but then she stopped, because what had dawned on him was dawning on her too and it was a peculiar and dangerous kind of hope.

"This could be him." Peter broke out into a joyful but complicated grin, as if he had just heard a hilarious joke, but was beginning to worry that he was the punch line.

Elizabeth said, "Yeah. It could. But it could be anything."

These last few years her husband had both hardened and softened. He was more vulnerable. More cautious. He still rolled with the punches, but when something bad happened, his recovery time was longer. Sometimes Elizabeth would find him sitting in the backyard at two or three in the morning, sipping a glass of wine and looking out at something she couldn't see. Or he would be playing with their boy, completely captivated by this beautiful, funny little person they had created, and then something would suddenly prey on him and he'd turn toward the door with a look in his eye like a fox on the hunt. Their home life was good. His work was good, her work was good, everything was good. But there was a time—and it wasn't very long ago—when their lives were also _interesting_. Sometimes it had been the good kind of interesting. Fun. Thrilling. Mysterious. Challenging. Like they were walking on air. And sometimes...

Sometimes it was the kind of interesting that left you unable to look yourself in the mirror. The kind that you came back from changed or not at all, and on those days you were gambling with your life and your family's lives and your stability and your freedom. Their son wasn't old enough to choose that gamble—he wasn't old enough to choose his own socks. She felt an echo of that excitement now.

An agent knocked once, then opened the door. "You're booked on the next flight out. Two-thirty."

Peter chewed a thumbnail. He could be there in six or seven hours. "Great work. Thanks, Stevens."

They waited until they were alone again.

Elizabeth sighed. "Do you have a go bag in the car?"

"I think it's him." Peter took a deep breath and furrowed his lip. "Feels like him."

"Well far be it from me to question the Burke gut."

"He could be coming home, El." He looked at her with desperation. He wanted it to be true.

"He burned his identity," said Elizabeth.

"I know."

"As far as anyone outside this room is concerned, he's dead. He can't come back. And you know sometimes I think—"

"Sometimes you think I just want him to be alive."

"I think hope looks good on you," said Elizabeth. "Beyond that, I can't—"

"You saw the same evidence I did."

"And that evidence could mean anything," she said. "He was an artist. He was a storyteller. He didn't like to hurt you. He always found a way to make the worst parts easier for you." It was one of Neal Caffrey's only reliable character traits. Despite the Burkes' game efforts, Neal had never been able to change what he was, but he was endlessly inventive in finding ways to shield Burkes from the blast radius—and the fallout.

Elizabeth had loved Neal dearly. She had known him as well as anyone had. She would love for Neal to be alive, and for him to meet the boy they had named after him. But everyone wished for a loophole around death and loss. Was there a chance that he was alive? Of _course_ there was. This was Neal Caffrey. Reality bent around him. But in that case, he had still killed his identity, beyond hope of restoration. He did that for a reason. That reason had meant more to Neal than his friendship with Peter and Elizabeth, his job at the FBI, and his love for Manhattan. Elizabeth knew, even more keenly than her boys, that these were powerful and stabilizing motivations. They had anchored Neal for years when he might have slipped away. When he should have slipped away. What motivated him to leave must be still more powerful. Assuming it all wasn't just a lovely fiction.

He must have thought—

He must have known it was all going away no matter what he did. In his last moments, he must have been very afraid.

"He was my friend," said Peter. "I have to go."

She nodded. "I wouldn't dream of stopping you."

"I'll be late if I don't leave now," he said.

"Do you want me to come?"

"I do." He kissed her. "But you shouldn't. You have work. Neal has preschool."

"And you don't think it's safe."

Peter shook his head. "Right now, El, I don't know what to think."

"Call me," said Elizabeth. "Whatever it is. You call me."

#

They left the printer in the room with the vandalized table. It was a small room. The table was bolted to the floor. So were the chairs. There was a one-way window, mirror glass, and there was a single door, which did not have a handle or a lock or anything interesting on the inside. Over the door, there was a clock. Up in the corner there was a small security camera. Down on the floor there was a heavy bolt, through which someone could thread a chain, but they hadn't chained him or cuffed his hands. Small mercies.

The silence was oppressive. The minutes crawled. It had been a while since he was allowed to wash and he smelled like sweat and dirt and ugly, mean places. The printer had stop himself from staring up at the camera. It was unlikely that anyone would be able to get a database match on his facial features but he was working the angles to make sure that nobody would try.

Could he escape this room? He thought about it for a while and then decided it was not an optimal situation. He would rather get himself moved, either to a room with more complicated security (which meant more exploitable flaws) or a simpler one (which meant fewer steps). Then he reminded himself that he didn't want to go anywhere. He'd reached his destination. Then, to divert himself, he imagined four and a half ways that he _could_ escape this room. Wait-it had a drop ceiling.

Five ways.

If they knew who he really was, they would have chained his feet to the floor.

He glanced at the clock. Four minutes had passed.

The printer, still in possession of the Sharpie, wrote the name of the ship that had taken him across the Mediterranean with the Chinese girls. Underneath he wrote the numbers of the shipping containers, in neat lines. He had spent a long time memorizing them.

He glanced at the clock. Seven minutes.

The printer put his head on his arms and closed his eyes. His heart beat: _there's always a way out, there's always a way out_ , _there's always a way out_.

#

Peter Burke was met at the door of the Customs and Border Patrol station by a smart young woman in a white uniform, who served him bad coffee in a small room plastered with pictures of wanted men. As was his habit, Peter scanned the wanted posters with intensity, as if he might see any one of these guys walking the streets of Manhattan. It wasn't likely. The kind of guys White Collar was interested in usually flew into New York with fake passports—or real ones. But it wasn't impossible either. An agent Peter knew at Quantico once saw a wanted poster in his office, and ten minutes later literally ran into the guy at a newsstand. Easiest collar in FBI history.

The Border Patrol agent's name was Gutierrez. "Damnedest thing," she said. "At first we're thinking accomplice, but the guy's not Mexican, and the cartels don't hire outside talent. The other dude we bagged, the driver, he says he dunno the guy's real name either. Nobody does. They just call him the printer."

Peter swallowed his coffee. "The printer. What does that mean?'

She chuckled. "What do you think, White Collar?"

"IDs," said Peter. "Or counterfeit cash."

"Sure," said Gutierrez. "That's what we thought. But we don't find ID on him, no ID on the truck, and the amigo who was driving used his own license. Cause he's stupid. Anyway the dude doesn't have any coke on him, no coke in his hair, he's not high. So we lean on the driver and he says they bought him. Like it's some kind of human trafficking thing."

"Human trafficking?"

Gutierrez shrugged. "Dude was pissed about it. He says the cartel paid more for this guy than the drugs are worth. Which is bullshit, but that's what he says. So we run that lead back to the cartel, and they say they bought him off the Venezuelan police."

"You dug this up in two days with no name?" said Peter. "I'm impressed."

"Well, don't blame it all on us," said Gutierrez. "This printer leaves a trail."

"Is he OK?" said Peter.

"Huh?"

"Is he hurt?"

"Medically... he checks out, I guess. He had some kind of stomach flu when they brought him in. That's how we busted him. We double check sick guys when they come through the border. You never know when you've got a mule who's dying cause he swallowed too much. But that wasn't it. He was just sick. He also got his ass kicked pretty good a few weeks ago—either that or he fell out of a truck, judging from the bruises—but that's not my problem." She hesitated. "We called in a shrink."

Peter scratched his chin. "Why?"

"He's been locked up for two days. Hasn't said a single word. And we'll help, you know. If it's human trafficking. We'll bust the guys who took him. It's not something we want here. I'd rather bust a human trafficker than a drug mule. This guy has left a trail of high value transactions from here to Caracas. He could be a US citizen. A hostage. We just don't know. We were thinking it might be some kind of mental trauma."

"So? What did the psychologist say?"

"Nothing. He wouldn't talk to her either."

Peter set his jaw. "He'll talk to me."

"I hope so, White Collar," said Gutierrez. "Brass would like this resolved."

"I'll bet." Peter had avoided the question for as long as he could, because he was worried he wouldn't like the answer. "What does he look like?"

"Ringo."

"The Beatle?" She was about twenty years too young for a Beatles reference.

"They all look like Ringo to me," said Gutierrez.

It could be, thought Peter. It could be. He swallowed a cold pit in his stomach and shook a tremor out of his hand. "I want to see him."

#

After nine hours, the printer heard Peter Burke's tread outside the door, and then the jangle of keys.

He rubbed his eyes. He thought, _wow, fast._ Then he thought, _thank Christ_.

The interrogation room door opened.

The printer looked up at Peter. He watched the FBI agent shuffle through a fifty-two card deck of emotions: anticipation, confusion, relief, disappointment, anger, sadness, suspicion. It was the face of someone who had walked through the door expecting birthday cake and gotten a punch in the gut instead. Peter had to brace himself on the door jamb. "Well," Peter said at last. He swallowed. "Now I know why this felt like him."

The printer crossed his arms and put his feet up on the table. "Thrilled to see you too, suit."

Peter gripped the bridge of his nose. "What is this?"

The printer grinned. Aside from the physical inconveniences this had been a pretty fun one, and he'd needed it. "What do _they_ think it is?"

Peter pounded his fist on the door. " _Mozzie, for the love of_ —!"

"Suit." Mozzie let his voice shake a little. "I'll tell you. But please get me out of here."

"Fine." Peter was settling into a sort of patient frustration, a slow burn. There were times when Peter required the patience of—well, the parent of a three-year-old.

Mozzie dropped his feet to the floor and stood.

Peter held up a finger. "Wait."

Mozzie sat back down.

Peter said, "Have you committed any crimes?"

Mozzie studied his fingernails. "Specify."

Peter spread his hands. "OK. Let's say within a hundred miles of the border in the last thirty days. Either side."

"No. I have far too much respect for you."

"And you've been held captive," said Peter.

"And I've been held captive," Mozzie agreed.

"In that case, Moz, why would you _—_?"

"Not here." Mozzie inclined his head toward the cameras.

"OK." Peter held up a hand. "OK. Give me an hour."

"Jeez," said Mozzie. "You used to be able to bust us out in fifteen."

"Oh, I still can," Peter assured him. "I'm gonna go somewhere and think about this for forty-five minutes."

"Fed," griped Mozzie.

"Con," Peter replied.

"You know how long I've been in here?"

"Not long enough."

It was petty, but neither of them felt too guilty about it. People were what they were.

#

Mozzie wouldn't stay in a hotel, so they went to a white stucco safe house in the suburbs.

Safe houses made Peter lonely. They all had the same sad, mean feeling. They had all been abandoned in a hurry, and before that they had been used for evil purposes. They were nobody's home. Peter texted Elizabeth—he wasn't ready to talk to her—and then took a couple of bags of groceries into the kitchen.

Freshly showered and shaved, freed from the grip of the Panopticon, back in the arms of his Lady Liberty after almost a year, Mozzie rifled through the bags. Peanut butter. Jelly. Bologna. Mayo. Macaroni and cheese. Chicken nuggets.

"Miss your kid, suit?" Mozzie asked.

Peter sat at a cheap kitchen table, scowling at him. "Yes."

"Whoa." Mozzie flinched. "Sorry." He pulled out a sixpack of beer and a bottle of cabernet. His little yessss trailed off as he inspected the wine label. He frowned. "When you bought this, did you really think Neal was back?"

Peter shook his head. "I don't know."

"Your best friend mysteriously rises from the dead after three years and you buy him wine from the grocery store?" Mozzie found a brand new corkscrew in the bag, and a set of wine glasses. He popped the top expertly and served himself. He came out of the kitchen with the bottle and the sixpack—he figured they would finish both—and handed Peter a beer. Peter curled his hand around the bottle with a look on his face like he might crush it.

"I'm sorry I'm not him," said Mozzie, staring into his glass. "I didn't mean to worry you."

"Sure you did. You did everything you could to worry me."

"If you knew it was me and not Neal, would you have come all the way down here to get me?"

"Yes." Peter twisted the top off his beer. "I would have."

"Today?"

Peter didn't answer.

"See?" Mozzie lifted his glass. "To absent friends. May they always be available to bail us out." He sipped, then made a face. "Seriously, suit, this wine is horrible."

"I'm saving up to buy Elizabeth a good bottle. Speed it up. I thought you were in London."

"I was," he said. "Consulting with the lovely Miss Sarah Ellis on a thrilling case of forgery for hire. She sends her regards."

"How'd you get to Caracas? Did someone grab you?"

"Yes. And no. I took some time off from Sterling Bosch."

"Too boring?"

"Sure. Let's go with that," said Mozzie. "Anyway I left the UK in the spring. Went to the Continent. Have you ever been to Europe, suit?"

"Yes," said Peter.

"Really? I thought you were psychologically incapable of leaving Manhattan."

"I chased Neal there in '09."

"Oh, right. Paris."

"And Belgium."

"Bruges?" asked Mozzie.

Peter shook his head. "No. I heard about Bruges after. I picked him up at the Vatican Library."

"Oh yes." Mozzie steepled his fingers over his lips and stared off into the wistful distance. "How I've missed it."

Peter's brow furrowed. " _You_ were at the Vatican?"

"Not with Neal." Mozzie held up a hand, as if to halt that train of thought.

Peter pulled up Google on his cell phone and typed in _security incidents vatican library_. "So when was this exactly?"

"Let's continue," said Mozzie.

Peter nodded. "I think that's wise."

"I was touring World War II battlefields."

"Yes, I remember your keen interest in 20th century European history."

"Quite. While on this intellectual and spiritual journey..."

"Ha!"

Mozzie pouted. "I met a mysterious stranger."

"Mysterious." Peter finished his beer and popped open another one. Despite everything, he was beginning to relax and enjoy himself. He was still annoyed with Mozzie, missing his family, sad about Caffrey, worried about the work he had abandoned to come here, but he also felt like he was returning to a familiar country he had not expected to see again. White Collar wasn't like this. Not anymore. White Collar wasn't _fun_.

Except when it was. "So," Peter said. "Tell me about mysterious."

"The venue," said Mozzie, "was a medieval tavern."

#

After a long day of walking the fields of Verdun, Mozzie, traveling under his perfectly legitimate and legal name of Teddy Winters—which you can totally check out if you're so skeptical, suit—returned to the tavern to put himself on the outside of a cold pint. Normally a drinker of fine wines, Mozzie had taken a shine to the tavern, which was supposed to be the oldest in the city. There were still singe marks on the wooden exterior from World War II! Mozzie was an easy mark for touristy kitsch, if it was done well, and he also had the fatal flaw of all conmen abroad: he liked to have a home base. The tavern also served the finest beers in Europe, lovingly crafted by Benedictine monks, and in his two weeks in Verdun, Mozzie was learning to love the hop almost as much as the grape.

Going back to the tavern was a mistake, because that evening, at the bar, Mozzie picked up a tail. The tail was not inconspicuous. He was wearing a Benedictine robe with a hood that hid his face. Even in French taverns, even to Mozzie, that kind of thing did not happen very often. Mozzie saw him sitting in a corner of the room, puffing on a pipe. The monk was staring at him and Mozzie caught a glimmer of the monk's dark eyes and beard.

Mozzie slid a few euros across the table to the bartender. "Do you know who that is?"

"Oh, he comes around from time to time," the bartender said. (This was in French, natch). "He always sits in the same place. What his given name is, I don't rightly know, but around here he's known as Strider—"

#

"Mozzie," Peter interrupted.

"What?"

"I have read Tolkien before."

"One does not read Tolkien," said Mozzie, holding a prissy finger up in the air. "One _experiences_ it."

Peter arched an eyebrow and opened another beer.

"Cope, suit," said Mozzie. "Strider is all you're ever getting. Don't ask me again later. You'll want to."

"Fine. But he wasn't dressed like a Benedictine monk. For one thing they don't have hoods."

"It didn't even really happen in a tavern," said Mozzie. "Use your imagination."

"You certainly are," said Peter.

"Anyway," said Mozzie. "I went to talk to him."

#

Mozzie bought two of the Gregorian beers and sat down next to Strider. "Take a picture," said Mozzie. "It'll last longer."

The monk said, "You're the printer." He had a thick Middle Eastern accent.

"Printer. That's a name I haven't heard in a long time," Mozzie replied.

#

" _Mozzie—_ " said Peter.

"Do you want to find out how I got to Caracas or not?"

"I care more about the why than the how. If you wanted to see me you could just come over. Elizabeth misses you."

"Ah. Mrs. Suit. A likely story."

"Will you please stop?"

"Nope," said Mozzie. "To _shorten_ this story—thereby depriving it of much thrilling local color—"

"Please," said Peter.

"And details about who punched me in the kidneys—it was some very angry Cubans—"

"Angry? With you? I can hardly imagine."

" _Strider_ told me that someone was shipping something from Namibia to the United States, and that as a resident of Manhattan, this should concern me. So I plied a few skills and took the safari of a lifetime, and I mean that in every sense of the word. I went to Namibia, I found the item, and I followed it. I leveraged my reputation—I'm sorry, 'the printer's' reputation—and had myself sold along the same illicit route this item was using. It's a long journey, suit, and a roundabout one. I'm tired. I have seldom been more tired. But it works. If I had not decided to disembark from the world cruise from hell, I'm quite certain I would have made it across the border. You're welcome for the cocaine bust by the way. And a couple of other little favors and considerations I don't want to talk about. This was the underworld of the underworld. I feel like I could drink a gallon of hand sanitizer." He made a face that said it would still be an improvement on the wine Peter had bought, but he also topped off his glass.

"Your favors always come at a price."

"Don't complain. You're still on the Friends and Family Plan. Ten percent discount. The _someone_ is an Australian by the name of James Quincy Bean. Better known to Interpol, White Collar and you as—"

"The Postman," said Peter, his eyes taking on a predatory gleam.

Mozzie pointed at him. Bingo.

Peter pulled on his chin. "I thought he only worked East Asia."

Mozzie shrugged. "Global now, I guess. I met him."

A smile played on the edges of Peter's lips. "You met the Postman."

"Lifted his wallet." Mozzie wiggled his fingers. "That's how I got his name."

"So that's the someone. What's the something?"

Mozzie stopped talking. It was like his mouth just dried up.

Peter said, "Come on. It's me. There's nobody else here. What's the Postman shipping to America?"

"I need a break." Mozzie smiled a rictus smile, stood up and stretched. He walked across the stucco house. It was an open floor plan, black slate floors, a huge pueblo fireplace, and windows that looked out on the desert. The furniture was cheap and ugly and the place was badly maintained. But you could buy furniture. "This is a good house, Peter." Out there the orange sun was setting. "You guys should keep this one."

Peter shook his head. "We don't keep them."

Mozzie was fidgeting, tapping his fingers on his thigh, glancing over his shoulder at Peter, walking to the window, ducking to look into the fireplace.

"You OK?" Peter checked the level of the wine bottle. Half gone.

"I'm not drunk," said Mozzie, without turning around.

Peter put his damp beer bottle on the table. "You know the only thing Neal was worse at than seeing the big picture?"

"Asking for help," said Mozzie.

Peter nodded. "That's a mistake that cost him everything."

"More than once," said Mozzie. "I know."

"You wanted me to be here and I'm here. I dropped everything. You have to tell me."

"I want to." Mozzie held up a hand, then ran it over his head. "I will. I just need a minute."

"OK," said Peter. He waited.

They watched the sunset.

"Did you like Italy?" Mozzie asked, after a while.

"What?"

"Rome. The Vatican. Did you like it?"

"I don't know. I was kind of busy."

"We have to go. Not to Rome. Obviously. Sardinia. Cagliari."

"Moz."

"Tomorrow. I want to sleep in." He rubbed his eyes. "We need money."

"Teddy," said Peter firmly. "I'm not going to Sardinia."

"The hell you aren't, suit."

"Take a deep breath," said Peter, "and tell me. Whatever it is, I promise I'll do everything I can to—"

"Uranium."

Silence.

Mozzie looked over his shoulder. "The Postman, James Quincy Bean, is illegally mining uranium 235 in Namibia."

"Stop," said Peter.

"He isn't selling it. He hasn't sold a gram. He's shipping it. I've seen it. I followed it. He's shipping it here, Peter. A lot of it. Hundreds of pounds. Yes, I said hundreds. And he's done it so quietly and so well that maybe three other people on Earth know about it. That's why I came in the way I did. That's why I lit a fire under you. Why I've spent a quarter of a year in places that smelled like a toilet, with people who scare me, and why it took me so long to get it out. Cause it's good to see you and I liked pretending everything was going to be OK. And now things are going to be different."


	2. Chapter 2

Two-thirds of the way through the wine bottle, Mozzie stopped talking. The little forger blinked owlishly at Peter, then walked over to the black leather couch that faced the fireplace. He sat there for a moment. Then, like a tree falling, he tipped over and rested his head on the armrest. Forty seconds later he was asleep.

Peter remembered a time when Mozzie would not have rested if half a dozen requirements were not met and several sacred objects not obtained, but three months as a prisoner really adjusted your standards: a duct taped couch on the American side of the border was comfortable enough. Now Peter Burke was the anxious insomniac; his day was not complete without reading _Pat the Bunny_ , finding the terry-cloth doggie, refilling the sippy cup, dispensing the ear drops, coaching Neal through putting on his PJs and slipper socks.

Peter got up and put things away, then sat on the end of the couch to think. If Mozzie had been even halfway honest, then he had uncovered a national security threat bigger than 9/11. But there was no evidence. Peter thought: Manhattan. He thought: Hundreds of pounds. He thought: Uranium 235 is fissile material. It's radioactive. _They put it in nuclear weapons_. But if you were going to build a nuclear bomb, you'd need more than raw material. You needed loads of specialized expertise. You'd need to buy expensive equipment, or steal it. To move it, you'd have to have lead-lined trucks. To handle it, special clothing and decontamination equipment. To work with it, a high tech laboratory. A pattern of transactions would set off alarm bells up and down both coasts. It wasn't Peter's specialty—he was familiar with a few radioactive inks and pigments, and knew some methods of authenticating artwork that measured radioactivity—but the entire division was cross-trained in counterterrorism. Peter would have heard something. News like this didn't come through a network of jumped-up conmen and art school dropouts.

Be reasonable, Burke.

Never mind everyone you care about lives thirty miles or less from Times Square.

He tried to FaceTime Elizabeth, but his phone wasn't working. He frowned. The house didn't have WiFi (he'd had to put an order through just to get the utilities turned on), but his cell phone signal should be coming through strongly. He slapped the base of the phone against his palm, like that would help, and looked at the signal strength indicator. Two dots. Three—two.

"Hey, Moz," Peter whispered.

Mozzie sniffled and stirred, but didn't wake. He muttered, "You'll never take me alive, copper."

Three dots again. One.

"Mozzie, wake up."

"Augh, augh, what, what, _what,_ " said Mozzie.

"Did you do something to my phone?"

"Your phone?"

"Look at this." Peter held up his phone. "It's almost like it's being jammed—"

#

A hard thump shook the safe house.

A blink of an eye later, all the windows blew out. The sound of shattering glass was overtaken by the roar and rumble of an enormous fire. Acrid smoke billowed out the windows and embers curled up into the sky. Blue and red and yellow flames set the insides of the place aglow. The fire was extremely hot. Even from the vacant lot across the street, Peter felt like he was getting sunburnt. His ears were ringing. At least his phone was working again. It buzzed in his hand. Text messages. D.C. El Paso. Manhattan. Elizabeth.

In the distance, sirens wailed.

Peter watched the fire for a while. He had his gun in his hand but kept it pointed at the ground. He didn't remember taking it out. They had bolted from the house at impressive speed. They were both still breathless. They stood shoulder-to-shoulder on the curb, surrounded by hip-high desert vegetation.

"Suit."

"Yeah."

Mozzie stared down at his shoes. "I may not have told you everything."

The building collapsed in on itself an explosion of sparks and smoke. A wave of heat nearly knocked them both down. Peter wiped soot from his face. "I deduced that, Mozzie."

"You know." Mozzie's chuckle devolved into a sooty cough. "That's a common misconception. When you make a broad generalization from a specific event, that's actually _inductive—"_

"OK," Peter sighed. "Who else wants you dead?"

"Else?"

"Besides me, U.S. Border Patrol, the cartel and the Postman."

Mozzie squinted. "Factory farmers?"

"Right. Who else?"

"I may have deep sixed a Russian arms deal. But that was ages ago. There's no way—"

Peter holstered his gun. "I can't believe this."

Mozzie squared his shoulders and stuck his chin out. "Favors and considerations."

Silence descended between them. Two bright red fire engines approached the smoking wreckage, and firefighters spilled out, but there wasn't much for them to do but soak the ashes.

#

"Nope," said Peter, stalking down the street. "No. No. No way. I am not getting sucked into this vortex of insanity. That's it. I'm through." He went toward the rental car, which he had parked two blocks away out of an exaggerated commitment to undercover tradecraft. Then he turned around. "God. I can't be through. I have to take you to D.C. You have to make a formal report."

Mozzie looked like a mouse in a trap.

"Don't you dare argue with me," said Peter. "Cowboy up."

Mozzie nodded.

Peter turned toward the car. Then he pivoted back. "People don't live like this."

Mozzie nodded.

"I catch _art forgers,_ " Peter told him.

Mozzie nodded.

"Don't do that," said Peter.

"What?"

"Placate me."

"I really don't know what you're talking about."

Peter sighed. "Just get in the car."

Mozzie raised his hand.

"Don't—" Peter started. "Fine. What?"

"Do I have to sit in the backseat?"

"No."

#

Technically Peter Burke was fleeing the scene of a crime. Not for the first time.

Greater crimes were afoot. Peter wanted to get to the airport. He didn't want to spend eight hours filling out a see-no-evil report that would lead to nobody's capture and solve nobody's problems. For the next several hours (at least) the better part of his attention would have to be dedicated to corralling Mozzie into an acceptable facsimile of a citizen, shielding him from an apparently bottomless list of international assassins, and running down a rumor of fissile material being smuggled into the United States.

When it came to handling a criminal informant, Peter ranked his skills against anyone's. For that matter, he _knew_ he was the only person in the entire U.S. Government who could even attempt to handle Mozzie. But this was so much bigger than the two of them. Taking Mozzie to D.C. was the smart play. The only play. Mozzie would have talk to Peter's division leader and a U.S. Attorney, and his information would be carried, via an unassailable chain of trust, all the way to the highest levels of the government. Mozzie would be in the Presidential Daily Briefing tomorrow. The machinery would begin to turn.

The machinery. The grinding, plodding, sifting, serious, professional...

Peter hit the brakes, then pulled onto the shoulder, as far over as he could. He turned on the emergency lights. Traffic whipped past them. Peter looked at Mozzie for a minute, then unbuckled his seatbelt and got out of the car. He walked around and sat on the front bumper. He looked up at the stars. From the highway he could still see the distant glow of the burning safe house. The airport was not far. Planes tore through the sky above them, flying low.

If they had a tail he would have to show himself or keep rolling. So there was that.

Mozzie got out after a minute, circled the vehicle and sat beside Peter.

"I'm not gonna play Find the Lady with you, Mozzie," Peter told him. "No games."

"Fine."

"You tell me the truth. Right here. Right now. You have no idea how serious this is about get."

Mozzie didn't respond.

"You have to understand," Peter told him. "When we get to D.C., I won't be able to protect you. They won't let me. They'll send me back to White Collar. And the people who take this over are not gonna care what happens to you. It just won't be a priority. I've seen it happen."

"I know," said Mozzie. "I was there. How quickly we forget." He took a deep breath and squared himself up. "Let's do this."

"Verdun. That was him, wasn't it. It was Neal."

"Yes," said Mozzie.

"The Benedictine monk with the Middle Eastern accent who put you on this."

"Yes," Mozzie confirmed.

"Sardinia?"

"As usual," said Mozzie, "your insights belie your unassuming bureaucratic exterior."

"Moz."

"Yes. I'm saying yes." Mozzie held up his hand to swear. "It was him. Neal is Strider. He's in Italy. And he found me in London, not France."

Peter covered his face with his hands. "London. I suppose he found Sarah there too."

"I didn't ask," said Mozzie.

"Of course he found her. Goddamnit, Mozzie. Everybody knew but me."

"He wanted you out of it. He told me to keep you out."

"Out of what? The Apocalypse?"

"We don't know what the uranium's for."

"Yeah, that's a real mystery. God. All these years and I'm still such an easy mark. _You_ don't work alone."

"Do you need a minute?" Mozzie asked.

"No. I don't need a minute. I've had years."

"I believed it too," said Mozzie. "For years. I _believed_ him. I don't think he ever intended to come back. I mean, he stuck the landing. He tied off all the stings in one move." Mozzie held up a finger. "Suit, I been doing this for thirty years, I'm the best damn con there is, and I'm telling you: nobody sticks the landing. Nobody bats a thousand. _Ever._ I honestly think he would've stayed dead if—"

"If it wasn't Manhattan," said Peter. "If it wasn't home."

"Yeah."

Peter rubbed the back of his neck. "This is going to break Elizabeth's heart."

"Right." Mozzie nodded sagely. "Which part do you want to tell her first?"

Peter glared arrows at him.

"What'd I say?" Mozzie asked.

They let the late night traffic pass.

"He left all of us," said Mozzie. "Not just you and Elizabeth _._ "

Peter shredded a thumbnail. "It's not kinder."

"Suit?"

"Just something El said before I left." Peter shook his head. "She was wrong. _This_ is not kind." He pushed himself off the bumper and hooked a thumb at the passenger seat. "Get back in the car."

"Are we still going to Washington?"

"What do you think?"

"We have to," said Mozzie. "And keep in mind who you're talking to here."

Peter scoffed.

"But we don't have to do it today." Mozzie smiled a closed-mouthed smile.

#

El Paso to Dallas. Dallas to Atlanta. Atlanta to JFK. JFK to London. London to Rome. Rome to Cagliari. Awake and anxious. Dozing and anxious. Talking to Elizabeth and anxious. Land underneath him. Sea underneath him. Getting cash off the emergency card in Rome, calculating the exchange rate in his head. Euros blurring up from an ATM.

What time is it in Manhattan? What time is it anywhere, really? Turbulence. He ended up in first class and he couldn't even enjoy it. The whole time he was thinking: this is what corruption really feels like. It feels like helping your friends; and like the dead leaving the grave; and ditching work on a whim; and free booze given to you by beautiful young women who speak four languages; and Mozzie making you laugh so hard your stomach hurts for twenty minutes. It's fun. He spent a day and a night and a day traveling and when he found himself in a black cab, being whisked past the piazzas, and around the citadel, it still felt like the same interminable night. A night that belonged to a different Peter Burke.

Every city had a color and Cagliari was pale pink and golden yellow and pale blue, like a basket of Easter eggs. A warm sea wind stirred the palm trees. The city sat at a convergence of ancient and modern. Neon and sodium-vapor lights illuminated narrow cobblestone streetss. Neat lines of nineteenth-century stone and brick buildings climbed up a hill that had an imposing castle at the top. Kids with cell phones illuminating their faces in stood the shadow of a twelfth-century church. How could this exist? How could this James Bond dreamland be _a real city_ that functioned in the same world as insurance paperwork and photocopiers and wanted posters? Manhattan had enough history to keep Peter busy, but this was like looking at the aftermath of a beautiful accident with a time machine. He tried to absorb it all at once, and remember so he could tell Elizabeth later, but the black car took them out of the city and toward the beach.

The cab deposited them at a slightly run-down Renaissance villa built of pink marble. Peter could hear and smell the sea nearby. The damp, warm wind ruffled Peter's hair and tugged at his wrinkled suit. Peter had brought money, but not baggage.

Mozzie smirked in an offensive way.

The front doors were tall and rustic. Mozzie knocked.

 _I shouldn't be here,_ thought Peter, looking out at the boulevard.

After a full minute, a tall, full-figured girl answered the door. She was maybe twenty-five, with olive skin, dark curls, and piercing green eyes. She wore only a red bikini and a short lace coverup. Catching Mozzie's eye, she grinned, but she observed Peter carefully, with unconcealed skepticism. She stood and moved like a dancer. Her full mouth had a witty twist of humor. She had a smattering of freckles across her innocent face and Peter thought: _Oh, boy. Watch out Neal Caffrey._ He was such a sucker for a witty brunette. Keeping a weather eye on Peter, the girl said, "Ciao il fratello Mozzie! Che piacevole sorpresa. Grazie al cielo abbiamo aperto il Brunello." A little toss of her head at Peter: "Chi è l'abito?"

Peter's ears perked on _fratello_ , brother, and Brunello—a wine label Mozzie wouldn't whine about, nor Peter, for that matter—and _l'abito_. She'd asked: who's the suit? Well. Neal had a type.

She bent over and kissed Mozzie on the cheeks.

Mozzie blushed, and looked smug as a green grape. "Ciao Abriana! Questo è ' _le_ Abito,' Peter Burke." He made the quote marks with his fingers: _the_ suit.

"Ohhh! Le illustre Agente Burke." She took one of his hands in both of hers; they were strong and warm. "Ciao. Welcome."

Mozzie said, "Peter, this is—"

"Abriana. I heard. Charmed."

Abriana arched an eyebrow at Mozzie, who shrugged. She sighed dramatically, already bored with them. "Esco." She raised her voice. "Lia! Esco!"

A shaggy little gray mutt trotted up to the door. Peter thought: _Really, Neal? A dog. Her little dog._ Abriana picked the dog up and deposited in a canvas backpack, which she slung over her shoulder. She looked Peter over once again, as if she might never again get a chance to observe his species in the wild, then slung the backpack over her shoulder and left.

"She's a graduate student." Mozzie smirked. "History."

"Not yet," said Peter, watching her hop behind the wheel of a red Jeep.

Mozzie laughed. "Come on."

The printer strode into the villa like he owned it, which was certainly not out of the question. It was modest enough inside, with red brick floors and plaster walls. The constant sea air made it smell sweetly of decay and salt. To the left of the foyer was a well-appointed Tuscan kitchen, rustic and warm. Rounding the corner into this room, it became clear that the classic old facade hugged a more modern construction, with rooms inside rooms like a set of glass nesting boxes. Step down a level from the kitchen and you were in an airy art and sculpture studio, where a—a very _apt_ homage to Gustav Klimt's _The Kiss_ seemed to burst from the canvas. Down another set of steps you found a sunroom full of built-in bookshelves. A wall of sliding glass doors opened onto a porch the size of a ballroom, bookended by a lap pool.

The marble porch disappeared almost seamlessly into the white sand of a private cove. Peter clocked an expensive security system that was integrated into the structure; a Spellman safe for personal valuables ( _good quality_ , Peter thought, _but not_ too _good_ ); and private beach five minutes from the most beautiful metropolitan center Peter had ever seen. He guessed 12.5 million American for the villa, not counting any valuables.

Not bad. Peter put his hands on his hips. "Who says you can't take it with you?"

In the kitchen Mozzie poured from a decanter. "Been holding to that one for a while, huh?"

"Three years. Is Neal _esco_ too?"

"Outside."

Peter surveyed the room one more time and then made his way through the labyrinth. Then he took a deep breath and stepped onto the beach.

Neal Caffery stood on the water's edge with his hands in his pockets. He wore flip-flops, a salmon-colored shirt, and jean shorts. In the same costume, Peter would look like a dad joke. His own son would roll his eyes. Elizabeth would laugh at him _._ Honestly: jorts. On the other hand, Neal looked like an ad for professional wealth management from the back pages of _Worth_ magazine. Always had.

"Caffrey." Peter stood a few feet back, trying to get a read on his old charge.

"Peter," Neal sighed.

Like a parent grieving a missing child, Peter had imagined a thousand versions of this meeting, each more cliché than the last. But Neal wasn't coming home to White Collar. Anything Peter had to say about loyalty, he'd already said by springing Mozzie and bankrolling an emergency trip halfway across the world on a Wednesday night. Anything Peter had to say about anger and disappointment would have to be tabled, possibly forever. Neal bolted from his screwups; a Peter Burke lecture on responsibility could spook him. And anything Peter had to say about grief—the transformation in the lives of Neal's friends in Manhattan, the sad little plaque Peter had placed on the heroes' wall in White Collar—wasn't worth the effort. You'd have better luck explaining photosynthesis to a golden retriever. Wrong subject, wrong audience.

Handling Neal was about precision and restraint. "I like the villa," said Peter, with exaggerated sangfroid. "It's very you."

"Me too. I guess I'll have to sell it now," Neal replied. "Mozzie brought you in?"

"He did."

Neal grimaced. "I told him to leave you out of it."

Peter nodded. "I know. This might sound crazy, but I think he's worried that nuclear terrorism is too much for you guys to handle on your own."

Neal wouldn't meet his eyes. "I've got it under control."

"I'm not even gonna ask what _that_ means," said Peter.

"How's White Collar?"

"Running a lot better now that you're dead."

"Really." Neal smiled slightly and folded his hands behind his back. "How's your closure rate?"

"Lower. But so's my blood pressure." That was the truth. Without Neal Caffrey around, Peter did not worry about his heart exploding as often.

Neal prodded. "You have a new CI?"

"No," said Peter. "We don't do that anymore."

Neal grinned. "Thanks."

"For what?"

"That," Neal said. "And for not trying to find me when you got the bottle."

Peter looked around pointedly. "Trying?"

"Oh, come on!" Neal squawked. "This doesn't count."

"You're standing right there. I'm 4 and 0."

"You filed my death certificate. You believed it. Did you know the FBI took out life insurance on me? They got a hundred grand. I did the math. They actually profited."

"Caffrey," said Peter. "I don't _try_ to find you. That's too hard. I just go to where you're gonna be and wait."

Neal scuffed the sand his toes. He looked out at the sea, then over his shoulder at the villa, which from this angle looked like a softly glowing Apple store. Regret passed over his face; maybe he really did like it here. "Look. I need a couple of days. Abriana—"

"Relax," said Peter. "I'm not arresting you."

"Wow. That's new."

"I've mellowed."

Neal blinked at him. "I have no idea how to negotiate this relationship."

"Try this," Peter suggested. "Tell me everything, or I _will_ arrest you—both—as hostile witnesses in a national security case. I'll catch the Postman myself while you spend the next year trying to find your way out of a military brig on Bikini Atoll. It sounds more fun than it is. They tested nuclear weapons there in the Cold War. Appropriate, don't you think?"

Neal cocked his head and closed his eyes like he was savoring a favorite wine. "Ah, yes," he said. " _That's_ what I remember. An anvil hanging over my head and Peter Burke holding the rope. I feel alive again."

"See? We're fine."

"You don't have to threaten me," Neal said. "I was going to tell you anyway."

"If you were going to tell me anyway," Peter replied, "it doesn't matter if I threaten you."

They smiled at each other like devils.

"Come on." Neal beckoned. "I'll show you the rest of the house."

#

Medici in front, Frank Lloyd Wright in back, and a World War II fortification in the basement: Neal and Mozzie must have scoured the planet for this place. It was a shame to drive them out of it, but that was the game. He couldn't let them keep a secret supervillian headquarters. Now that Peter was involved, this operation would have to go on book, and—eventually—those books would have to be shared with the Italian police, Interpol and the FBI. The villa was already yesterday's news. Hard feelings? There were plenty of them. But Peter controlled the definition of _eventually,_ and there was a time limit on all the Neal Caffrey hideouts. Sand through the hourglass; water under the bridge.

In the meantime, between _eventually_ and _fin,_ they had stuff to get done.

During the war, the squat cement room underneath the villa had been a gun turret. Now a big library table took up most of the room. A high-end computer system had been set up at the head of the table. A stack of legal pads sat in the middle of the table. Half of them were filled with Neal's indecipherable shorthand. The other half were blank. A chessboard had been set up at the other end.

The guys had drawn right on the walls with charcoal pencils. One wall had a network map, focused on the Postman and his contacts. The opposite wall supported a world map marked up with dry erase markers.

Peter recognized the casework. It was his own style. He had taught Neal to break a case like this.

"What d'you think, suit?" Mozzie sat behind the computer.

"It's incredible," said Peter. "Moz. It's White Collar."

"Except we have decent coffee." Neal sat on the spiral staircase, watching Peter. They both knew he wouldn't have had the patience for this work five years ago.

"And decent broadband," said Mozzie.

Peter was insulted. "The broadband at the shop is fine."

Mozzie rolled his eyes. "Please."

Peter sat down at the library table and put his chin in his hand. He took a deep breath. "OK. Tell me how you broke it."

"The containers," said Neal.

"Right." Peter touched his forehead. "You have to have lead-lined containers to move fissile material. That's good work, Neal."

"Wrong," said Neal. "It's incredible work." He got up and walked over to the network map. He touched the file photo of Quincy Bean, at the center of the network. "Last spring, word on the street was the Postman was looking for a forger who could make containers for celluloid film. This interested me."

Mozzie piped up. "Celluloid is very flammable. It has to be kept in special vaults at the Library of Congress. Before they used it to shoot movies they used it to shoot guns and they called it—"

"Flash paper," Peter finished.

"Like our fissile material," said Neal, "it's dangerous and has to be moved carefully."

"And it's valuable," said Peter, playing it out. "You'd need special paperwork and security."

"All the trimmings," Neal agreed. "Look, you don't have to tell me knocking over the Library of Congress would be cool, but you can't fence nitrate film. There's no market for it. This stuff scares the hell out of archivists. It's more unstable than nitroglycerin and the film is unwatchable on modern machinery. I don't care if they have new footage of the Kennedy assassination in there. So I ask myself: what if he's not smuggling something _out_ of the library? What if he's smuggling something in? And what besides cellulose film needs that kind of containment?"

Mozzie said, "It's not a long list."

As the idea took root, Peter felt a chill run down his spine. "Spring." Peter kicked the leg of the table. "Damn it, guys, that was six months ago. Were you planning on ever telling anyone?"

"I didn't know if it was for real," Neal insisted.

"D.C.'s bad enough," said Peter. "But they could be taking this stuff anywhere. Or everywhere. As long as they can write a convincing destination on the manifest. There are cellulose archives in Los Angeles. The Museum of the Moving Image is in Astoria. For Chrissake, the New York Film Academy is ten minutes from Federal Plaza. I can walk there from my _goddamn_ _office!_ "

"Hey," said Neal. "I'm here. I came back. I put Mozzie on it. I ran my own investigation. Peter, look around you. This is your legacy. I built the Cagliari branch of the FBI!"

"No," said Peter. "No. Caffrey, this is _so far_ beyond you."

"Is it?" Neal shot back. "We're small. We're fast. We have an unlimited budget. We know how to do this. Just think about it."

"You're art thieves!"

"And all of this is focused on art museums. Who better? Tell me, Peter. Tell me and I'll pack up this office right now and move it there. Who better?"

Mozzie was tired of this. "Look," he said, standing up. "This conversation hurts all three of my feelings, but could we have order in the courtroom, please? We still have unanswered questions here. Neal, sit down. Suit. Peter. Back off."

"Mozzie, my family—"

"It's OK," said Mozzie. "The stuff is raw. It's a rock someone dug up out of the ground. It has to go through some kind of processing. Right?"

Peter was biting a knuckle.

"Suit?"

"You're right," he said.

"We have time. This isn't happening tomorrow. So listen up." Mozzie picked up a charcoal pencil and picked a blank space on the wall. He wrote a 1. "Our first problem is: Who is the Postman working for? He's a contractor. He doesn't have _ideas_. He doesn't have this kind of money. If you busted him, Peter, it wouldn't help. They'd find another smuggler. I don't know about you, but I like my shipping routes where I can see them. Two: What are they planning to do with it? Are they refining it? Where? I don't think the New York Film School has a physics lab. So. Three: Timeline. Are they in the middle of transportation or are they finished? And what happens if we spook them?"

Neal had taken what looked like his usual seat, beside Mozzie's computer, in front of the chessboard. His fedora hung on the ear of the chair. He found a blank notepad and took a pencil from the pencil cup. He touched the tip to his tongue. "The Postman has the answers," Neal said.

Mozzie nodded, "Or he can lead us to the guy who does."

Neal was not getting this down. He was sketching. He spoke softly, focusing on his charcoal drawing of the Manhattan skyline. Peter waited for the shoe to drop. The only time Neal ever made original art was to siphon off nervous energy. "That's why I set up a face-to-face with him tomorrow in Rome."

Silence.

Mozzie looked at Peter. Peter looked at Mozzie. They both stared at Neal.

Neal looked up, his eyes innocent as a boy's. "What?"


	3. Chapter 3

"OK, what you've got in there is a watch battery, which will give you ninety minutes of—"

"I have done this before, Moz."

"It's been a while."

"Yeah, but it's like riding a bike." You never forgot. "Ninety minutes?"

"Ninety minutes."

Neal always felt fizzy before a con. It was a good feeling. Day-to-day life had a kind of drudgery to it that made it hard to pick your feet up after a while. There was only so much Brunello a guy could drink, only so many dips he could take in the hot/cold infinity pool, only so many times he could beat himself at chess. Trickery kept his hand in. It kept him in contact with the sometimes tenuous thread that held him to reality. It reminded him of the potential for failure that kept his self-confidence from turning into a deadly liability.

Arriving in Rome, Neal had gotten his shoes shined and his nails manicured. He'd gotten his suit jacket pressed while he knocked back a couple of espressos. By the time he met Mozzie and Peter at their suite in the Waldorf Astoria he felt like he was standing in his own personal ray of sunshine. He felt like he was about to give a world famous international smuggler the worst day of his life. He grimaced as the tiny bug in his ear came on. He was treated to a fingers-on-the-blackboard audio screech that seemed to eat into his brain. "Interference, Moz? C'mon."

"Hold on a minute."

Neal clamped his hand over his ear. "Please fix this."

"I'm fixing it."

" _I'm_ out of practice?"

They hadn't chosen the Waldorf because of its five-star rep. Neal's favorite hotel in Rome was the First Luxury Art Hotel, where the staff knew him by name, or at least _a_ name. But unlike the First Lux, the Waldorf overlooked the public fountain where Neal was supposed to meet the Postman in less than an hour. Moz had set up his electronic surveillance systems on the dining room table. If Mozzie hedged right up against the window and looked to the northeast he would be able to maintain a bird's eye view of the meet. Peter would run the op from a cafe across the street from the fountain.

 _Peter Burke running him from a cafe across the street_. The reality of that became clear when Mozzie handed Neal a knockoff Rolex. With an audio bug in Neal's ear, a GPS on his wrist and Peter handling, they really were playing all the old standards. It was all right—a relief, actually—an unexpected pleasure. The years Neal had spent at White Collar were hard ones but it was the only time in his life that he had been surrounded by people who cared about him. He'd missed the camaraderie. He'd missed feeling protected, and knowing that when he stepped forward there'd be something under his feet.

It was also terrifying. Neal had not been idle these last three years. Since he'd killed the Caffrey identity, his legal name was Benjamin Keel, a reclusive tech billionaire who had retired in his middle thirties with more money than the U.S. Mint and nothing on his conscience. With nothing at all to lose, he had thrown everything into establishing himself as a globetrotting playboy. He'd built an unassailable legend that concealed the sources of his walking-around money. But the truth was that nobody cared where "Benjamin Keel's" cash came from as long as it kept coming. Everyone with millions of dollars had something to hide. "Keel" was smart, stayed out of debt, and kept everything meticulously aboveboard.

What would ultimately draw the unfavorable attentions of the FBI were Neal's hobbies. It was paper that collared Neal Caffrey—always had and always would. He kept a forged stamp in the safe at the Cagliari villa that he could sell tomorrow for forty-five thousand dollars. Peter knew Neal's work the way a professor would. That stamp would tie the Keel identity to the Caffrey bonds and that would be it. Peter was a good friend, but he was a cop first. It was one of the reasons Neal had steered his old handler out of the villa. Neal kept too many secrets there.

But having Peter _literally in his ear_ was hardly better. Benjamin Keel played things close to the vest, but Neal Caffrey told Peter Burke things. It was a fundamental law of his nature, like thieving and lying and escaping. And Neal had lived a lot longer and more fully than Ben. When he clipped the heavy watch around his wrist, a part of him he wondered if he would ever be allowed to take it off again. Of course if he really was busted on the stamp—or identity fraud... or... or... or...—he would be back to begging for a GPS tracker. As an alternative to prison.

He wasn't sure he could pull it off this time.

So the thing to do was make it fun for Peter, and give the FBI agent something bigger to think about. Neal knew he was number five on Peter's priority list so it was a lucky break that the other four things were in danger. Or not so lucky. Most of the things Peter worried about ranked pretty high on Neal's list too. Manhattan. Peter's family. If they weren't under threat, Neal wouldn't be here at all. He would still be safely dead and his friends would still be safely out of the picture. Ultimately, and as usual, Neal had landed himself in this less than satisfactory situation.

"You're on," said Moz.

"Right." Neal scratched his wrist, then tugged his sleeve over the watch. "Peter."

Peter was already in place at the cafe, but his voice came through on Neal's earpiece like they were standing right next to each other. It was far clearer than any of the FBI kit Neal had worn during his years at White Collar. These days, he and Mozzie could afford the high-end stuff.

"You should get down here," said Peter. "You can case it before he gets here."

"I did," said Neal. "This morning and an hour ago."

"I don't like this," said Peter. "It doesn't feel right."

 _Nothing about this is right_ , Neal thought, but he said, "Can you see me on your phone or not?"

"I've got you."

They were both quiet for a minute, and then they both laughed at the same time. Neal was nervous; he laughed so hard his eyes watered.

Peter said, "I guess we're playing all the old standards."

Neal shook his head. It was unhealthy to be this in sync with a cop. "Let's see if we can write a new one. I'm coming down. Tell me when you see me."

#

The con was simple, but Caffrey wasn't making art or even money here. While Mozzie was James Bonding it up and down Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, Europe and the Americas, Neal had been making the connections to reach out to the Postman personally. He had only one message to deliver: _We know what you're up to._ Mozzie's photos of the uranium mining operation had sealed the deal.

At the time, Neal had no idea what the Postman was really up to, but that didn't matter. It was enough that Neal could find him. He had made no threats and no promises, only left a phone number where the Postman could contact him day or night. Every few days, whenever Neal judged it safe, he would send the Postman another one of Mozzie's photos.

For a smuggler, it was a psychological bomb. The Postman would sense danger all around him but wouldn't be able to identify it. He would know that his trade route was vulnerable. Considering the photos, he would have to suspect his closest associates. Considering the nature of what he was doing, the number of ways everything could go wrong were crazy-making, and some of the potential outcomes were truly horrifying. It took a pretty stiff constitution to survive being caught.

Even if he suspected a fishing expedition, the Postman would have to come to Europe. Once they met, Neal would persuade him that he could repair the Postman's broken security, in exchange for being fed information on the operation. He trusted that the Postman would try to deal with the situation himself instead of running it up to his clients. At this level, admitting fault and vulnerability was an excellent way to become not just an ex-con but an ex- alive person.

Once he was on the inside, Neal would make himself indispensable to the operation—he was good at that—and the truth of it would open up to him like a flower. Then they would turn the machine against its owner and then Neal and Mozzie and Peter Burke would bring the guy to the halls of judgement in handcuffs—or whatever. That part wasn't really in Neal Caffrey's wheelhouse. The mechanics of justice had always been a bit cloudy to him.

The point was he could put a stop to this.

When he was sure Peter had eyes on him, Neal circled the piazza once, getting one final look at the lay of the land. The place was jam-packed with tourists and had about a billion exit points. Neal bit his lip. With a spring in his step, he walked over to a flower-seller and bought a single red carnation, which he threaded through the buttonhole on his lapel. That was what he had said to the Postman: I'll be the guy wearing a red flower. Neal always had loved the classics. That task finished, he scanned the piazza and approached a man in a suit, who was striding with purpose, carrying a designer briefcase. Neal took off his hat, ruffled his hair, then tapped the man's shoulder. He smiled. "Excuse me. Do you speak English?"

"Uh, yes?" The businessman squinted at him through fussy little tortoiseshell glasses. "Can I help you?"

"I want to buy your briefcase," said Neal.

In his ear, Peter said, "Neal." Neal flinched and had to resist cupping his hand over his ear. If they were going to keep doing this, they would have to get cheaper audio equipment. This top-of-the-line stuff was messing him up.

" _Excuse_ me?" asked the businessman.

"I like your briefcase," said Neal. "I'll give you a thousand Euros for it right now."

"Is this some kind of joke?"

"Fifteen hundred." Neal took the cash out of his inside pocket. The businessman seemed reluctant to part with his accessory, and Neal was pressed for time. The man was in his sixties and wearing a wedding ring. He had a mustard stain on his tie. Fine.

Neal put on a desperate expression. "Look, you probably don't care, but my fiancee is graduating from law school and I forgot to get her a present." Never mind that it was November. The mark wouldn't. "I'm supposed to see her in half an hour. I can't disappoint her again. She'll break it off. Please." Neal smiled the sweet, sickly smile of a man in love and in trouble—that one, at least, was never hard for him to dredge up.

The man melted. "Here," he said, "just take it, son."

"Oh, man, you saved my life," said Neal. "Here." He tried to press the cash into the man's hand.

"That's not necessary."

"I insist," said Neal.

"You take your girl somewhere nice with that," said the man.

"Oh, jeez, thanks again." Neal shuffled his feet and blushed.

When the man passed into the crowd Neal had to stop himself from smiling over his shoulder at Peter, who was sitting at his two o'clock. Neal Caffrey was walking away with a free Ferrigamo briefcase. The mark would go home feeling like a million bucks and never mention the loss to anybody, except in a story that made him feel like a hero. And Neal hadn't even broken any laws.

Peter groused, "What're you up to, Caffrey?"

Neal nearly tripped over his own shoes. He threw up his hands. "Peter, call Mozzie, find out whatever earpiece we used to use and buy one, OK? Otherwise, let's skip the DVD commentary. This thing is throwing me off balance."

The next one was easy. When he offered a young American tourist seven hundred Euros for his KREWE sunglasses, the kid couldn't get them off fast enough. Neal slipped them on, then flipped his fedora back onto his head with a flick of his wrist. Just like that he was the invisible man, no more identifiable than a Magritte painting. Only the details stood out: the red carnation, the glasses, the expensive briefcase. He was a designer suit with no face. If he wasn't decked out with two thousand dollars' worth of surveillance kit he was sure even his friends would lose him. Just to irritate Peter, he changed up his stride just enough that it didn't read like Neal Caffrey's. He made his appointed meeting place and time with seconds to spare. Neal didn't need Peter's voice in his ear to know that his handler was laughing at him, even though they were in the middle of deadly serious business.

Then they waited.

Neal met his marks but the Postman didn't.

Neal stood in the middle of the piazza on the northwest corner of the public fountain. It was a damp day in late fall, but people were still flicking coins into the water, making out, taking pictures. Neal searched faces and listed for a Australian accent. He was too seasoned an operative to go searching for the faces of his friends, but as time inched along he felt increasingly exposed.

Then he felt a tiny stabbing pain in his lower back, which turned into a sharp pain. The tip of a knife was being pressed into his back. "Give me your phone." It was a kid's voice, a girl or a young boy, not American, not English, not Australian, but speaking careful, educated British English. The kid was about eighteen inches too short to speak in Neal's ear.

Oh, _terrific_.

Neal was going to be the first con in history to be mugged _while running a con._

"Listen," said Neal, "you're making a huge mistake."

"Am I? Phone. Wallet. Now."

Neal took his burner phone out of his pocket and passed it behind him. He passed his billfold as well. Ten Euros and an expired library card.

The kid scoffed. "Do you think I'm stupid? Your real wallet."

Neal's real wallet had the Ben Keel ID in it. He hesitated for a minute, then took it out of the secret pocket and handed it back as well. Even after what he had paid for the shades, there was two grand in there. Not a bad haul for a kid mugger. Neal wondered what Peter was doing. Nothing, probably. The meeting had almost definitely been scuttled, and about the only worse outcome would be for Neal to be made as a cop or a spy.

"Do you feel where my knife is?" asked the kid.

"Yes," said Neal.

"I move my wrist one inch," the kid said, "and I'll stab you in the kidney. You'll die."

OK. Maybe getting made wasn't the _worst_ outcome.

Peter's voice exploded into Neal's head. "I'm on her. Say the word."

Her. A girl. Neal twitched his fingers and shook his head a quarter of an inch. _Stay back._

"Get wet," said the girl.

Neal didn't dare move. "You mean..."

"Get in the damn fountain," she said. "Get _wet_. Head to foot. Soak your electronics. Shades. Watch. Everything. Then take them off. My name is Clara. My father is James Quincy Bean. You want to meet him? Convince me. And then..." She plucked the flower from his lapel. "Follow me."

In Neal's ear, Peter said, "I can get you out of this."

Neal shook his head. The girl's knife was still digging into his back. He slipped off the GPS Rolex and tossed it into the fountain. He took his hat off and put it on the ground next to the briefcase. He'd have to count on Peter to retrieve it.

"Don't do this," said Peter.

"I'll come back," Neal promised, speaking so softly his lips barely moved. He stepped forward to relieve the pressure of the knife. "I'll come back this time."

"Come on, Neal," Peter said. "For once, listen to me."

But they weren't talking to each other. They were talking to themselves.

Peter's voice was steady. "Hey. Look at me. _Caffrey_. Think this through."

Neal shook his head. He turned and stepped up on the stone edge of the fountain.

He thought: stop me.

Then he closed his eyes and dropped face-first into it. The water was only a foot deep but he let it swirl around him. He let it soak through his suit and his shirt and all the way to his skin. His earpiece went _kree_ and shorted out. He heard people laughing all around him, thinking he was goofing around.

The water was cold as November. It tasted like chlorine, like coins.

#

The girl moved at a brisk stride that took them out of the piazza and onto busy side streets. He was only able to stay on her because she'd threaded the carnation into her ponytail. Clara Bean, if that was her real name, was maybe fourteen, small, scrawny and fierce. She was also black. The accent Neal had trouble placing was West African, laid over with school Australian. She wore a red cotton dress and a blue wool peacoat and kid gloves and suede boots. She had red ribbons in her hair. She still clutched her knife in one hand, down low where almost nobody would notice it. Neal did not feel a moment's hesitation about following her. He recognized that clear-eyed determination. He couldn't _not_ follow her: he was following himself from twenty years ago. Looking at her made him woozy. She was from the same family as Neal and Mozzie: kids who had learned to make it before they hit double digits. Kids who worked their own programs.

The crisp fall air had turned brutally cold. Neal Caffrey was shivering and his eyes were burning. Water trickled down his back and his shoes squished. They would be ruined before the day's end.

After ten minutes of jogging, doubling back and threading through a department store Neal was as sure as he could be that they had lost Peter. Clara led him to a narrow alley between two buildings before turning quickly on him and backing him against the wall. "He's not who you think he is. He's not... he's a good man."

His back pressed against the cold wall, the chill leaching in, Neal nodded. "I believe you."

"He took care of me," she insisted. "My parents died and he took me in. He raised me like I was his own. He didn't have to."

"I lost my parents too," said Neal. "My dad's a fugitive and my mother drank herself to death." Peter didn't know that. Even Moz didn't know about Neal's mom, though he had probably inferred it. Why he said it to this girl, he didn't know, except that he was a trust hoarder and he knew it would change how she saw him. "I was young. People took me in. They taught me how to survive. Nothing I do could ever pay them back."

She let him off the wall and peered up at him. "Are you really an orphan?"

"I'm really something," he said.

She chuffed.

"Yeah," he admitted. "I am. Everyone's gone. The family I still talk to—I shouldn't."

"Cos it's not safe for you?"

"For them," said Neal. "I got myself into bigger trouble than they could handle."

She looked at him and instead of seeing an older version of herself she was looking at an alternative version of someone she cared about. Her mouth tightened and she set her jaw. "I guess that happens."

"It does if you stay in the life. But you don't have to stay in."

"OK." She closed her knife and put it in her pocket. "You can see him."

She took Neal's cold hand in her small, bony one and led him down the alleyway. One side was brick and one side was white marble. Boxes and garbage bags nearly blocked their path. Looking over his shoulder Neal could see only a hand's-width of Rome. A glimpse of the Colosseum, a gray sky. Neal heard her softly counting steps. Before they reached the end of the alley she turned and pushed aside a pallet and a pile of moldering blankets that were gathered up against the marble wall.

Neal was looking down at an archway, perhaps two feet high. Etched above it, deep into the stone, was an Eye of Ra. Neal touched it. The stonework was good. He had heard about these old thieves' tunnels in cities like Rome and London. The secrets were passed down in families or criminal associations for generations. Or maybe they were just lost and found and lost again, the stories growing up around them. He shook his head in astonishment. "Unbelievable."

Clara got on her hands and knees and went inside. Neal followed her.

The tunnel ran along the inner wall of the building, in a small space between the stone facade and the drywall, before emerging in a tiny courtyard formed by the abutment of three ancient buildings. No window looked directly down on the courtyard. It was clean of detritus. Light and cool air came down from a postage-stamp opening, high above them, open to the elements, and yellow grasses struggled to survive in the cracks of the pitch floor.

Sitting on a piece of corrugated plastic, warmly wrapped in colorful blankets, was the Postman, or the man who had once been the Postman. In Neal's photos, the man had only been Peter's age, middle forties, but in person James Quincy Bean had the air of a frail and elderly man. His face was scabbed and scarred, and pale as milk, and he stank. He was wearing a knit cap and shivering. He seemed very near death. His eyes had a sheen of gray over them and blood was on his lips and the handkerchief he clutched in one hand.

Neal was spooked, but fearless Clara knelt beside him and took one of his hands in hers. "Pa!"

Bean looked at her and reached out to touch her hair. "Oh. My girl."

"I brought the man," said Clara. "This is him."

As if every motion brought pain, the man turned his focus to Neal Caffrey. He struggled to focus. "My blackmailer. What's your name, mate?"

"Ben," said Clara.

Bean smiled darkly.

"Neal Caffrey." Neal squatted down to look Bean the eye. "What happened to you?"

"I got caught," said the Postman. He coughed violently.

Clara pressed his hand to her heart and put her head on his shoulder.

"We need to get you to a hospital," said Neal.

"From the looks of it, you'd benefit more than I would," said Bean. "I'd be dead before we got to the end of the alley. But you're still shivering."

"What happened?" Neal asked.

"I lied." Bean grinned a red-rimed grin. "I lied to everybody. My—my client. He thought I was digging up the yellow rock, you know, he hired me to clean out his mines and move the stuff, but I didn't—I lied to the old bugger. Charged him out the nose too. I made it look _good_." He sniffled. His eyes were watering. "I thought it was you... caught me. But I roped you in too. Didn't I? I can see it on your face." Coughs wracked him again, until he cried. "Clara, honey."

She stepped away and dug through a backpack nearby.

"Ayo, not the water. The flask now." The girl brought him a silver flask and he took a long draught from it. He coughed again once and wiped a trickle of blood from his mouth.

Neal sat down on the ground. "What are you saying? Are you saying—?"

"The containers are empty... they were... just soil..."

"I don't understand," said Neal.

"Dust," he said. "He found out and he..." Bean lost focus for a moment, before chuffing and shaking his head. "I think he put the dust in my inhaler. The uranium dust. This..." He gestured at his failing body. "Didn't realize until... until I got here. I'll be gone soon. Thought I had snowed him good, but..." He squinted at Neal. "This is all about the _dust_. He's going to... now you're the only one who knows..." He rubbed his eyes. "When you get home, you need to wash. Throw away your clothes." He held up two fingers "Two trash bags. It's only a bit of dust. That should be enough. Then you need to _go._ Go and find the truck..."

Tears tracked down Clara's cheeks. "Papa."

"The last load," said the Postman. "It isn't a dummy. It's dust. The yellow dust. It's moving. Do you... do you understand?"

"Who's the client?" asked Neal.

Bean stared through him.

Neal snapped his fingers. "Bean. Who did this to you?"

"Leave him alone," said the girl. "He told you what to do."

"Then come with me," Neal told her.

"No way. I won't leave him."

The sick man had drifted into a fitful sleep. Every few seconds his body was wracked by a painful shiver. "Then wait for me," said Neal. "I'll come back. I'll bring police. Paramedics. He can tell them what he told me."

"Get out of here," she said. "Can't you see he's dying no matter what you do?"

"I have to go," Neal said, backing up to the low passageway.

"Yes," said the girl.

"I have a friend who works in the government," said Neal. "He'll know what to do."

"I won't see him," spat the girl. "Go get the truck."

Neal extended a hand, as to a troubled sister. "You heard what he said. You could be poisoned too."

"You know what?" She stuck out her small dark chin. "I hope I am."

Neal looked at the backpack. Did it have the inhaler in it? "I'll come back."

"You'll never find the thieves' hole again," Clara promised. "I'll close it up."

"I—"

"Piss off now," said Clara. "If he could, that's what he'd say."

#

The staff at the Waldorf Astoria had seen worse than a freezing, soaking wet man in a designer suit in their lobby. Neal attracted no outcry as he sloshed through the lobby and into an elevator. It carried him up to the suite with the view of the fountain. He reached into his jacket for the key, and then remembered that Clara had taken his wallet—both his wallets. She hadn't returned them. Maybe they were sealed up forever in the thieves hole with two cold corpses. Maybe she had already used Ben Keel's credit cards to book a flight out of Rome. Neal rested his throbbing head against the door and knocked.

Mozzie opened it. "What happ—"

Neal waved him off and went into the bathroom. He stripped down to his skin and got in the shower. He scrubbed until he was raw. Under his fingernails. His hair. _Dust_. It got in everywhere, didn't it. _Dust._

He should have searched the Postman. He should have taken the backpack.

He wasn't thinking. He should've taken the girl.

He heard Peter knocking. "Caffrey."

"I'm all right." He got out and put everything in the trash. Socks. Shoes. Underwear. He tied up the trash bag tightly. In the closet he found the plastic valet bag and tied it all up again. Safe? _It's only a bit of dust._

His hands were shaking. He'd put the water on the hottest temperature for half an hour. He was red as a lobster. But he was still cold down in his bones. He put on a heavy robe and knotted the belt tightly, then padded barefoot into the room.

Mozzie and Peter were sitting across from each other at the dining room table.

"We have to go to Namibia," said Neal.

Mozzie and Peter exchanged a glance that said, _you take it_.

Peter said, "Neal—"

Neal held up a hand. "The Postman's dead," said Neal. "They poisoned him. I'm gonna go lie down. Wake up your contacts down there, Mozzie. Anybody you talked to when you were investigating. We need to find out everything we can about this uranium mine. Especially who owns it. Be discreet."

Peter took a deep breath. "Neal, when you cut out like that it makes me think—"

He knew what it made Peter think. It was the fundamental conflict in their relationship. "They killed him because they found out he was fudging the shipments," said Neal. "They found out because they got suspicious. They got suspicious for a reason. Moz, tell me the truth. Is it possible we did this?"

Mozzie didn't answer. His look said _not while the suit's in the room_.

That was all the answer Neal needed. "OK." He pinched the bridge of his nose for a minute. _Get through it, Neal. Bite the bullet._ He let his hand fall. "We screwed up. You were right, Peter. This is too big for us." He thought of Clara, the strength and the anger in her eyes, and the blood trickling down the Postman's chin. "Tickets, Moz. We have to find the next shipment. I know how they're processing the uranium."

"How's that?" Peter watched him with an expert's eye.

"They're making it into dust," he said. "They're going to aeresolize it."

"And then what?" said Mozzie.

"Neal, you have to talk to us," said Peter.

"And then what?" Mozzie repeated.

Neal went into one of the bedrooms and locked the door behind him.


	4. Chapter 4

Peter Burke slammed his phone down so hard on the tray table that the battery sprung out. It tumbled onto the floor and disappeared under the seat in front of him. Beside him, in the aisle seat, Neal grimaced. "Let me guess. They don't believe you."

"Not believing me would be a step up," said Peter. "They think I'm having a psychotic episode. You better be right about this or I'm not gonna have a job to come back to."

Neal looked up from his phone. "Honestly, if we're right about this, your job is the least of our problems." He was reading the Wikipedia article on radiation sickness.

"I know," said Peter. "I just—I mean, look around."

They were sitting in first class again. Conmen always traveled in style, not that it helped. Neal drummed his fingers on the armrest. He leaned out every few seconds to survey the aisle. He bounced a knee like a speed addict waiting for his fix. Neal didn't actually dislike flying but the _process_ bothered him. The security, the seatbelts, the lack of control, and the boredom all set off his personal safety radar. No environment reminded Neal more of the restrictions and relentless paranoia of prison life. Mozzie, on the other hand, had cozened up to the window, chased a couple of Xanax with a couple of gin and tonics, stuffed a pillow under his ear and passed safely beyond all worldly concerns.

That left Peter in the middle. Of course. "I mean here we are, and we're talking about –I don't even know what the hell we're talking about anymore. And people are just..."

"Flying," Neal finished.

"Yeah. Going on with their lives. And me. I'm still worried about what D.C. is gonna to think when I bring you and Mozzie down to testify." He chuckled darkly.

Neal lifted his eyebrows and pretended he hadn't heard that one.

Peter said, "We'll have to, you know. Eventually. Have you thought about it?"

Neal fidgeted. "Not really."

"You should," said Peter. "The mess you left behind..."

"Smaller than the one in front of me," said Neal.

Peter smiled. "That's not going to cut it forever."

"It doesn't need to," said Neal. The conversation was making him uncomfortable but it wasn't like he had somewhere to go. "It just needs to cut it long enough." He waved to a stewardess to bring him a glass of claret. When she came back with it, he gave her a sweet smile. She took a step back, then blushed. When she was gone Neal showed Peter a napkin with her phone number on it.

Peter shook his head. "Fine."

Neal paused with his glass halfway to his lips. "You know what really gets me?"

Peter raised his eyebrows in anticipation.

"Statistically speaking," said Neal. "About twenty percent of the people on this plane are thinking the same thing."

Peter furrowed his brow. "I don't get it."

Neal sipped. "Well, some of these people, they're traveling cause they had a death in the family. Right? Or they lost their jobs and they're moving back home."

"Or they lost everything in a scam," said Peter.

"Maybe," Neal agreed, with a _you got me_ smile. He looked out at the strange faces, trying to guess why they might be on this plane, traveling south. "It's not Christmas, and they can't all be tourists. So something is happening in their lives. Anyway, they've got to be thinking _I can't believe everything is going on just the same._ Now." He turned his glass on the tray table thoughtfully. "They're not worried about what you and I are worried about but ultimately... what's the difference?"

Peter thought about that for a minute, then shook his head. "And you think that's twenty percent of the people on this plane. One in five."

"Think? No. I know it is."

Peter tipped his head to focus on his friend, thinking: _interesting._ "You OK, Neal?"

Neal grinned. "I'm always OK."

An evasion, not an answer. Of course.

The plane banked up against some turbulence, then suddenly dropped several dozen feet. A few people gasped. Mozzie stirred. Even Peter grabbed the armrest.

Neal didn't react at all, but a few minutes later he shook out his napkin and dropped it over his empty wineglass. A moment later Peter heard a soft _plink._ Neal whipped off the with the air of a professional magician. In the bottom of the glass, sitting in the tiniest pool of claret, was a Sacajawea gold dollar. Neal tipped it into his hand, then wiped it with the napkin till it was dry and shiny. Then he rolled it between his fingertips, turning it from one finger to the other without letting it drop once. He closed his hand around it and made it disappear, then opened his opposite hand, where it now sat in his palm.

Peter stared for a moment, then looked out the window. It was easy to think that everything Neal did had a secret subtle meaning—and this was often true; Neal had trouble speaking his mind. But trying to keep up with Neal and Mozzie and the nineteen hundred different ways they communicated made Peter tired, frustrated and not a little sad.

"What do you think we're gonna find in Africa?" Peter asked.

"Honestly?" said Neal. "Something you and I should've tracked a long time ago."

He didn't mean uranium dust. He meant: the next thing, the bigger ante, the high rollers' table. Before Neal's untimely "death," Peter had been braced for that himself. Neal Caffrey was a world-class talent who'd been attracting attention from the entire cop-and-criminal enterprise for years. At this point he _was_ a cop-and-criminal enterprise, all on his own. So something bigger was always coming for Neal. What was bigger than recovering Nazi treasure? Taking out the Pink Panthers—and knocking over the Federal Reserve in the process. And what was bigger than that?

Well, for one thing: a whole host of excellent reasons to commit pseudocide.

"We're right behind 'em," Peter said.

Neal nodded.

"I mean we're _right_ behind 'em," said Peter, tapping the tray table. "We're in their footsteps."

Neal nodded.

"Caffrey." Peter spoke in the same way that he spoke to his son when he needed him to understand something important. Fair enough—he had learned to handle a three-year-old by first learning how to handle Neal Caffrey. It worried Peter that someone as bright as Neal needed things broken all the way down, the way an innocent child needed them. But it also told Peter, relentlessly, something about the world and his role in it.

In this life, some people were weapons. Some, shields. "You understand, at some point—at some point—"

"I can't be alive _and_ dead," Neal finished. "I can't be Neal Caffrey and have a plot on Hart's Island. At some point, my stories collide and I have to pick one."

"No," said Peter. "I was gonna say, at some point it stops being up to you."

"Does it?" He smiled slyly.

"Yes," said Peter. "It really does. How many times have we both gotten on a plane in the last few days?"

"A lot," said Neal.

"A lot," Peter echoed. "I know you're using a fake passport. You're breaking five hundred laws in four countries. I know you've committed fraud and I don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure out what else I can get you on. How many times have I stopped you?"

Neal was silent.

"Neal, you picked a story when you looked Mozzie up in London and started an international scavenger hunt for nuclear weapons. And you knew that. Because you can't do this alone, and you can't _not_ do this. Not anymore. White Collar changed you."

"Come on, Peter," said Neal. "Anybody would do this."

" _Anybody_ can't do what you do," Peter insisted. "We have to figure out how we're gonna handle this from now on."

"Don't be so pessimistic," said Neal. "The bad guys might actually get us this time."

Peter shook his head. He looked at the pieces of his broken phone on the tray table. "Ten years we've been doing this and you still don't know what you're capable of."

Neal looked like he was about to reply, but then something else crossed his face and he turned his head and flashed a Cheshire-cat grin.

"What?" Peter asked.

"Moz," said Neal. "I know you're awake." But he was looking at Peter when he said it.

Mozzie opened his eyes and lifted his head. "That's kind of creepy, Neal."

"You were eavesdropping," Neal pointed out.

"I was gathering intelligence."

Peter shut his mouth and looked down at his hands. Evasions upon evasions—but what was he supposed expect from Neal Caffrey? Confessions? Mozzie folded his hands behind his head and looked pleased with himself. Neal pressed the stewardess button and signaled for another glass of claret.

The plane banked and the fasten seat belt sign came on.

#

The Windhoek International Airport was smaller than it wanted to be. In essence a regional launchpad with a very long airstrip, it was hugged by orange desert scrub and more than forty miles from the city it was supposed to serve. They disembarked on the tarmac and looked out at a squat glass terminal.

Late fall in Europe was late spring in the southern hemisphere and the wind was hot and the dust covered everything. Peter rolled some of the fine grains between his fingers and thought about the speed of dust. Neal put his hat on and tipped it at a rakish angle and surveyed the land with his hands in in his pockets. He looked like he had been an expatriate in western Africa for his entire life. In real life, only Mozzie had been here before, and he led them across the hot asphalt and into the terminal with the determined air of someone embarking on an expedition. Inside was a single duty-free restaurant and a single baggage claim and taxi stand and Peter felt like he was standing in a bus station. Surely they weren't going to take a taxi. But that was where Mozzie went, and he shook hands and had words with a taxi driver barely out of his teens who wore a bright yellow safety jacket and carried a iPhone. As soon as Mozzie ended the conversation, the kid pulled out the phone and started making calls.

Mozzie trotted back to them. "We need to wait a couple minutes."

Neal was curious. "For what?"

"You wouldn't believe me," Mozzie promised.

"Moz."

"Neal."

Mozzie wouldn't tell him, and finally Neal bored himself playing Bejeweled and bored himself staring at the newspaper stand, while Mozzie and Peter started a pickup game of Go Fish with Mozzie's trick deck. Peter knew Mozzie was cheating but that was the point of the game; Mozzie would try to get away with it and Peter would try to figure out what he was doing. A few minutes became more than an hour and Peter could tell that the wait was driving Neal slowly mad. After ninety minutes, Peter had to stop him from running up change at the food stand. It wasn't that Peter didn't sense the sand running through the hourglass; he just handled it better. Around fifty percent of Peter's job was waiting in some confined space for someone's time to run out.

"Just sit down," said Peter.

Neal paced back and forth at dizzying speed. "I've _been_ sitting for hours."

"Right, so you know you won't die of it," said Peter.

Neal muttered, "Says you."

"What's that?"

"Nothing."

At long last, Mozzie perked up and leaned over to look past Peter. They were gathered around a small table in the corner of the restaurant. Mozzie wouldn't sit with his back to a room. He stood and wiped his hands on his shirt and crossed his arms, then put his hands in his pockets, and then let them fall to his sides. He settled on folding his fingers behind his back like he was being cuffed. Picking up on his reaction, Neal and Peter stood and turned as well.

"You're right," said Neal, "I don't believe it."

"Please don't ruin this for me," said Mozzie, through his teeth.

"Moz," said Neal, affecting hurt. "I wouldn't dream of it."

"I wasn't talking to you."

Peter didn't have time to respond because at that moment a woman came up to Mozzie, threw her arms around him and kissed him warmly. "Hello, love."

Mozzie embraced her in return and for a moment there was a look on his face like he had just been hit by a train. When she stepped aside to smile at them—her arm still threaded around Mozzie's waist—Peter recognized her, not as a person but as a type. She was like a girl version of Mozzie, if Mozzie was African, and beautiful, and had shoulder-length dreadlocks the color of brushed bronze. She was about forty, short and scrappy in stature, with little round steampunk sunglasses. She wore jeans and dusty suede boots and a white lace shirt and a leather bolo around her neck. On her right pinkie finger was a yellowing bone ring, its face carved in the shape of a skull, its eyes tiny rubies. It wasn't her face that reminded Peter of Mozzie so much as her carriage and her way of moving, but there the resemblance was so strong that it was like they'd grown up together.

She surveyed Neal and Peter with intimacy, lingering on Neal—as women, and criminals, tended to do—but not for too long. She pulled her sunglasses down with the tip of a finger. Her eyes were the palest brown, almost the color of cork. She locked eyes with Peter in a way that conveyed that she understood exactly what he was, and what Neal was, and what they were to each other. Peter smiled and returned the look, as if they were predators meeting on neutral territory, which was more or less the case. This was part of the problem Peter had when he spent too much time with Neal and his ever-more-exotic cast of friends: he got too used to being sharp. Back in the civilian world people didn't spend ninety percent of their time trying to get ahead of each other. Normal people didn't communicate on this level.

"Guys, this is Mercy," said Mozzie. "Mercy, this is—"

"Agent Peter Burke and Neal Caffrey," she said. "The knights of Manhattan."

Neal smirked at Mozzie, who blushed. Neal said, "Yeah."

Neal tried to shake her hand, but she ducked out of it, smiling the whole time. "Sorry, swendelaar. I'd like to keep this ring. Why don't you keep your distance." She took a step back. "Just about there is fine." Her accent was high-class-Jo'burg, but Peter guessed that she'd either gone to college or done time in London as well.

"'Knights of Manhattan,'" said Peter. "I like that."

She clasped Peter's hand unreservedly, then, after taking his measure, pulled him in for a quick hug. "Don't blame it on Teddy," she said. "You two have a reputation."

They did, but Peter was surprised it had gone this global. Neal had drawn the same conclusions. He kept his hands in his pockets and gave her the space she demanded. "You're Interpol."

"About as much as you're FBI, or Teddy's Sterling Bosch," she acknowledged, meaning, _very much so_ , and then again, _not at all_. She arched a sculpted eyebrow at Mozzie. "I assume this isn't a social call."

"I wish it was," said Mozzie. From the look on his face, he dearly did. "I really do. But we gotta get out to the dig."

She took a step back. "Today? With _these_ blokes?"

"Hey," said Neal.

Mozzie raised his hands. "I know. I wouldn't've come if it wasn't important."

She glanced at them again and then nodded. "Fine, but you're not going to find much. They cleared out two, three days ago."

"What d' you mean cleared out?" Mozzie asked.

"They've shut down the entire dig," she said. "I took the bossman out myself."

"Wait," said Peter. "Are you telling me they're done digging at the uranium mine?"

"Place is a ghost town, liefling," said Mercy. "Not that it was all that big an operation to begin with."

Neal said, "I need to be there."

"OK," she said. "But it's in the Sperrgebeit. You understand. It took me six years to break in to the business. And members of the public aren't supposed to go in at all."

"I know what the Sperrgebeit is," said Neal.

Peter said, "I'm missing something."

"It's the diamond mining district," Mozzie explained. "DeBeers owns half and the Namibian government owns the other half."

Mercy said, "You need a stack of special permits just to look at the bloody place."

"Best behavior." Neal crossed his heart. "I won't steal a thing." Casing a place was not illegal or even suspicious. Neal was very clear on that.

Mercy smiled impishly. "Just keep your hands to yourself and don't get any of those clever Neal Caffrey ideas. These gents aren't sweet-hearted and tender like me and your FBI friend here. They'll shoot you in the head."

Peter thought: _best of luck controlling_ him _in a place called the diamond district_. But of course it wouldn't be her job to control him. He turned started to head out toward baggage claim and the front door.

"Where are you going?" Mozzie asked.

Peter said, "Doesn't she have a truck waiting?"

Mercy looked at Mozzie. Mozzie looked at Mercy. _You tell 'em. No, you._ She nodded at Mozzie and he said, "Not exactly."

#

Neal had been a kid when the Gulf War happened, but he recognized an Apache helicopter when he saw one. Tucked in on a helipad just behind the airport, it resembled nothing so much as a dull green wasp. Though its weapons were long gone and it had been rigged up as a cargo vehicle, it was intimidating as hell. No less so when Mercy No-Last-Name jogged out in front of them and leapt, gazelle-like, into the back to check the seatbelts and communications equipment inside. Peter had jogged ahead too. He hopped up in the passenger seat, put on the giant headphones and fiddled with dials like he knew what the hell he was doing.

Neal hung back so he could walk out with Mozzie. His once and future business partner watched Mercy like his eyes were nailed to her body. "She's an old chopper, captain," Mozzie said, "but she checks out."

"So," said Neal. "You and Mercy."

"Yep," said Mozzie.

"Mercy and you." Neal didn't bother to ask if it was serious. All he needed to see was the way Mozzie set his mouth when he looked at her, not that you needed to be some kind of Mozzie expert to figure this one out. "How long has that been going on?"

"Eh. Four months. Mostly over Skype." Mostly. "It's going well."

"You didn't tell me about her."

"Hm," said Mozzie, scratching his chin. "Wow. Guess it slipped my mind."

"I tell you about all my girlfriends."

Mozzie made a face. "Your girlfriend is married."

"She is not," said Neal.

"Yeah, but the point is she's in love with a different guy," said Mozzie.

Neal shrugged. He knew where he stood with Abriana. And sat. And laid. And several other interesting positions. That was the point; their relationship was solid because they knew where the line was. Neal didn't ask Abriana about her fiance and Abriana didn't ask Neal about his finances.

"Two questions," said Neal, holding up two fingers.

"Only two?" said Mozzie.

"'Liefling?'"

"Afrikaans," said Mozzie. "For sweetie."

"She likes Peter."

Mozzie sighed. "Everybody likes Peter, Neal. He's honest."

Sure. Peter Burke was easy to like, just as long as you remembered that honest didn't necessarily mean stupid. Once you got Peter, you either liked him forever or you wanted to get rid of him right away. Women and girls picked up on that as soon as they met him. It took most cons a little longer. "So what does swendelaar mean? That's what she called me."

Mozzie chuckled. "What do you think it means?"

"I think she's too smart for us, Moz." said Neal.

"Yeah." Mozzie grinned. He was proud of her.

Mercy had made her way to the pilot's seat. As they watched she leaned out and beckoned. The old helicopter's blades gave a rusty sigh, and then began to churn the air. A great cloud of dust blew out from around the chopper. Neal held on to his hat. Mozzie took one step forward and then remembered to wait for his friend.

"She's good for you," said Neal.

It wasn't a question, but Mozzie said, "She is."

Neal plastered on a big smile. "Then it's great. I'm happy for you."

He meant it. He was happy. He wasn't jealous or surprised that Mozzie had a private life. He suffered from a different and somewhat weightier volume of disquiet. Three years of silence had changed a lot of things. The Burkes had a kid. Mozzie had his helicopter pilot.

And Neal—Neal was the same guy.

And it was OK. It was. One of the tough lessons of his hard-won freedom was that his limitations were not forced on him by the Bureau of Prisons or the FBI or even society itself. They were his. They were baked in. When he was working for the FBI he'd worn a GPS tracker—worn it for so long that his heart still dropped when he remembered its familiar weight. But that hadn't kept him from his goals. On the contrary: it had connected him to a way of life that was beyond his skills and, frankly, beyond his comprehension. And while there were many pleasures and compensations for his losses—the limber Abriana, the freedom of wealth, the thrill of the chase—the people he cared about most would continue to grow and change. They would put down tap-roots and flourish while Neal continued to skim the surface. If they all stayed friends, Peter and Mozzie would have spend their middle and old ages remembering to move slowly so as not to pass out of Neal's range.

Oh, there had been a lot of reasons to close this book.

Already inside the helicopter, Mozzie held out a hand. Neal hesitated, then took it. Mozzie pulled him up and showed him how to secure the five-point harness. Neal put on a heavy pair of headphones. The roar of the helicopter's blades dulled to a thrum. Neal had done a lot of things before, but there was a first time for everything and this was Neal's first time riding a helicopter. He found a microphone attached to the headphones and tipped it under his mouth.

There was no door to close. When Neal gave the signal that he was buckled in, the Apache shuddered and the ground dropped away.

#

They buzzed toward the diamond district at an aggressive pace. The helicopter flew low and Mercy stayed off the radio, if she didn't have a compelling reason to be on it. It wasn't a matter of smuggling. She had the right to be there. Mercy's helicopter with its call number in white and it's shark's teeth painted on the nose were a well-known sight in this part of the country. It was just a question of working cleanly and respecting the privacy and sanctity of the place.

"A lot of it is a wildlife sanctuary now," Mozzie told Neal.

"Yeah?" said Neal. "I think I spotted anti-aircraft batteries down there."

Mozzie shrugged. "Well."

Neal pressed the red button on his chest and the belts that held him in his seat snapped off. He ignored Mozzie's snorfling panic attack and dropped to the floor of the helicopter. He crawled on his elbows over to the unprotected edge. Here a gunner would have once sat, but now there were no guns, only the holes where they would have been attached.

Neal folded his hands and put his chin on them, like a kid watching TV. From this position it was easy to forget about the helicopter, the sounds, the slightly nauseous feeling and the uncomfortable seats. Even the demands of his body, thirst, frustration, seemed parenthetical. He heard Moz and Mercy crosstalking about him and didn't even bother to listen. The summer wind whipped his hair and the air was so dry it almost burned. Dry desert gave way to rocky dry washes and copses of scrubby trees, then orange claybeds, then low charcoal-colored hills, then desert again. He spotted small groups of houses, but when they flew over them, he realized they were abandoned. Whole neighborhoods, even mansions, had been abandoned and slowly sandblasted until they were the same dun color as the dry desert. Sand spilled from doorways and windows and banked up against the sides of buildings. There were no roads, no bridges. In the heat of late afternoon, Neal didn't even spot a single animal, though he did notice black clouds gathering around distant black mountains.

They came to a place that looked like the surface of the moon, with craters that went down and down into the earth, gray, tan, and orange or gray smeared with orange, and tiny figures pushing wheelbarrows or carrying stones up and down their narrow spiral paths. Heat seemed to rise up from these holes as much as it pounded down from the sky. He felt the grit of sand and ash in the back of his throat. Neal had seen his share of mine-work in Southeast Asia and didn't care to see it again, but it would still be there whether he looked or not. So he looked.

His headphones crackled. "Thoughts, swendelaar? You've got a funny look on your face."

Neal furrowed his brow and pressed the button on his radio. "You can't see my face."

"Your FBI is frowning at you," said Mercy. "That's how I know."

She was too smart. Keenly aware that this was a party line, and he had the rare opportunity to play three people at once, Neal said, "Peter always frowns. I think his mouth is stuck that way. It's one of the job requirements at White Collar."

He couldn't tell if he had needled Peter or made him chuckle or both. You had to press a button to speak, and that meant you had to want to be heard. It was a funny way to talk, punctuated by static, unsure if any of your witty little _bon mots_ had landed. Without the eye contact and the little noises and a good view of what people were doing with their hands and feet, what was the point of talking at all? Tone of voice didn't give away everything. You could barely tell if people believed that you believed in what you were saying.

Mercy said, "There's a bigger swindle going on down there than you could possibly imagine. Are you jealous?"

"Absolutely. When I do it, it's a swindle, but when a government teams up with a cartel..."

"It's an economy," Mercy sighed. "That's terribly profound. I suppose next you'll say behind every great fortune is a great crime."

"I'm a millionaire," said Neal. "Tell me I'm wrong."

They had passed the diamond mine but there was another up ahead. As Neal watched, the tiny figures down below stopped their work for a moment and put their hands over their eyes and looked up. Neal fought the impulse to wave.

"You ever wonder what makes diamonds so valuable?" asked Mercy. "Not why a fancy pink is worth more than a trip zero, but why any of them are worth anything at all?"

Neal thought about it. "Honestly? I never, ever have."

The helicopter turned and dropped and Neal was thrown against the base of the seat next to him. He had to grab on to it in order to avoid being tossed out of the open door.

"Hold on to your hats, lads," said Mercy, ten seconds too late. "We're at the dig."

Neal held on to his bruised ribs.

He gasped, "Thanks, Mercy," but didn't open the channel for her to hear.

#

The encampment had a short runway and a helipad. Both were nearly covered up by sand, but the Apache blasted much of it clear as they landed. Mercy threw her headphones off and jumped out of the chopper as soon as its rails touched ground. Neal followed her, tugging the wrinkles out of his suit as he stepped onto the plain. The camp sat on the edge of another screw-hole dig, with a winding path going deep into the earth, but there weren't diamonds in this one. Neal took a turn around the place with his hands in his pockets, careful not to touch anything, trained by now to care for a crime scene and watch where he put his feet. _We're right in their footsteps_ , Peter had said, and now that was literally true. Neal was standing where they had stood. And what had they seen?

Visibility to the curve of the horizon in every direction. Jagged black mountains to the northeast, and at the very limits of perception, the black line of the ocean. Miles of wild desert. The loneliest and most hidden place imaginable. The biggest haul Neal had ever snagged was the Nazi treasure from the lost U-Boat. You could hide more U-Boats in this square mile than there were buildings in Manhattan with not a single person the wiser, ever. It was a truly lawless place.

This mine had been picked clean and abandoned to the elements some years ago—five, ten—but then someone had a new idea and they had come back. Three prefab buildings had been assembled on the edge of the crater, and they had run electric wires and satellite Internet connections, high tech. They'd had guns and plenty of ammunition. Neal knew this because some of the stuff was still here. The group had left in a hurry and done a messy clean-up. The wires had been torn out, the high-tech communications equipment smashed, and the buildings set aflame. The place stank of formaldehyde and ash. The flame had burned hot but not efficiently and a lot had been left behind.

Put it together, Caffrey: they had killed the Postman and dusted off.

Whatever was happening, it was happening right now.

"The land was originally owned by a German guy named Franz Boer." Mozzie had perched on the edge of the helicopter and was reading off his phone. "The whole family worked for De Beers until the nineties when this part of the district was sold to the Namibian government. But the family maintained an interest. The son married a Namibian girl."

A family project.

Neal closed his eyes. He tapped his foot to a beat only he could hear.

"What?" said Peter. "Hey. Neal."

Neal waved two fingers. He needed Peter to sheepdog these people so Neal was free to work.

"Where are the other structures?" Neal murmured.

Peter said, "What?"

"Mercy," Neal called.

"Hey," Mercy replied. She stood at a safe distance mimicking his hands-free posture, but she was tense. Her clothespin shoulders were hunched.

Neal said, "Where would I find an indoor space big enough for heavy equipment? Like a warehouse or a hangar."

She sniffed. "Here?"

Neal nodded.

"God, I don't know. You'd have to go back to the original dig," she said. "I've done a few runs with the bird out to this site but I've never been in. There are underground structures—"

"Show me," said Neal.

"You want to go down into the mine."

"Yes."

"It's been shut down for years. I doubt it's structurally sound."

"Oh, it's sound," said Neal. "They were using it." He swallowed and glanced at Peter. It was a look that petitioned for help and signaled that this was not everyday Neal Caffrey bullshit. True, he used that look on Peter even when it was bullshit—sometimes especially then—but he trusted in Peter's powers of logic and discernment.

The FBI agent sat in the passenger seat of the Apache with his feet hanging out. He nodded. "Let's do it."

Mercy looked over her shoulder at him, then turned to Mozzie. "Teddy," said Mercy, a sharp edge in her voice. "I need a ruling on this swendelaar."

"Patience," said Mozzie. "He won't lead you wrong."

"All right," she said. "Get the flashlights. And the water bottles. Blow me, I didn't pack for this."

"We won't be there long," said Neal.


	5. Chapter 5

Most underground places were as cool inside as the land outside, without the inconveniences of wind and weather. If they were dry, they were the perfect place to store works of art or papers. Neal appreciated a good cave. This was different. In the Sperrgbiet mines, heat radiated up from the earth. The temperature ran ten or fifteen degrees hotter than the outside, with much less air circulation. It was like stepping into a microwave. As they stepped into the old mine, Mercy, Mozzie, Neal and Peter were soon drenched in sweat. Mercy and Neal carried flashlights the size and weight of frozen chickens with batteries that had to be carried in shoulder bags. Neal shrugged off his suit jacket and folded it carefully over one arm.

The mine was very quiet and they could feel the weight of the earth above them.

As soon as they were inside, Mercy, who led the way, took out a pair of tortoiseshell glasses and exchanged her shades for them. If not for that practiced motion, Neal might not have picked up on the slight tremor in her hand, or the way she edged up close to Mozzie so their shoulders nearly touched. He thought: _she's claustrophobic,_ and filed that away for later, but who knew if there would be a later. The point was that like Mozzie—and Peter—she was not _fearless._ Neal faced anxiety frequently, but almost never fear. He passed through a world that hardly ever felt like it was beyond his control. Mozzie had a litany of fears, ranging from wise to paranoid to wisely paranoid, but in all the years Neal had known him, he had never flinched from necessity.

Neal knew valiance was a rare and valuable quality, and his estimation of Mercy went up a bit. He tried to check in with Peter to see if the agent had also picked up on this, but he was stymied. Peter was wiping the sweat from his face, and using a penlight from his pocket to peer into the depths of the mine. No reason for that. They wouldn't be going in much further.

The place was here. Here was the place.

Neal strode past Mercy and left the group behind. He swept his flashlight around the room. It was of a decent size, large enough that three of Mercy's Apaches could have easily fit inside, nose to tail. It had a newly poured cement floor. Neal's light caught the silhouette of a piece of heavy machinery. He recognized it. Moz would too.

Neal bit his lip and turned his beam upwards. Thirteen-foot ceilings. There was a lot of stuff up there. Fixtures for florescent lights. Large exhaust fans. A sprinkler system. Neal followed the wiring along the ceiling and down the wall, to a simple switch. He crossed to it and flipped it on. He expected nothing, but heard a low electric hum. A moment later, the lights slammed on. Geothermal power? There was enough heat for it.

Mercy murmured, "I had no idea the new digs were this extensive."

"He was smart," said Neal, without turning around. "He watched his back. He would have had a rotating crew out here. A deep bench of couriers, diggers, everything. Nobody would have done enough of the work to understand what was actually going on out here. Ask your friends." Neal nodded to himself. "You'll be able to trace him."

Once, this room had been little more than rough break through the crust of the earth and into the mine, but it had been extensively excavated and modernized. Along one wall were a set of new lockers and hooks for clothes and hard hats. An eye wash station. Long worktables sat in the middle of the room. A few empty containers were still there. Neal rolled one over with his foot. WARNING – FLAMMABLE – CELLULOSE FILM. Ignoring several edicts about preserving a crime scene, he hooked a fingernail underneath the label and peeled it off the container. He held it up to the light. The print work was not bad but the paper and adhesive were wrong. Cardstock was too expensive for this use. Paper will always get you in the end. In the right hands, it opened doors and bank accounts. In the wrong ones, it communicated far more than you intended. Neal put the label in his pocket and went over to the machine.

It took up about a quarter of the space and looked like a giant version of the rock tumbling and polishing kits you could buy for kids. He put his hand against it, getting to know it, the way he got to know a safe before he broke into it. He put his head against its side and closed his eyes, listening, thinking. Had the Postman stood here? Had Clara? Assuredly. And who else? Where was this all going?

Who _else_?

 _Find the truck._

"Peter," he heard himself say, "this is where they processed it. There is no physics lab in D.C. or Manhattan. They did it right here, with this." He turned around and leaned on the machine. He crossed his arms and his legs.

"Neal," Peter replied. "I need to know exactly what we're talking about here."

"Dust," said Neal. "I don't think there's a bomb at all. Not in the conventional sense. They took the uranium and they pulverized it. They turned it into nuclear dust. Really fine, Peter, so it floats in the air. Think of the way dust floats in a sunbeam." Neal nodded. "They loaded it into the film containers. Sealed the containers. Shipped them out of here through Mozzie's trail and over the border to—" Neal went silent. But he knew, if he didn't keep going, Peter would push him and the whole case might fly apart in his head. "Imagine if they released a container of this stuff in a city. It's basically nuclear fallout. Even if it didn't make people sick right away—"

"Mass panic," said Peter.

"It would be Chernobyl," said Neal.

"Fukushima," said Mozzie. "You couldn't pay people to come back."

"I don't understand," said Mercy. "Why would someone _want_ to do that? Kill a city."

"Not just one city," said Mozzie. "The buyer thought he was getting truckloads of this stuff. It was a huge industrial operation. Look at the size of this place."

"Neal," said Peter carefully. "How far could this stuff spread? Are we talking about a city block here? A neighborhood?"

"You're asking the wrong person," said Neal.

Mozzie said, "It would depend on a lot of variables." They all focused on him. He blinked and took off his glasses and rubbed them on his shirt, which did precisely nothing for the moisture collecting on them. His shirt was sweaty too. "If they released it in a subway—"

" _Jesus_ ," Peter muttered.

"It could theoretically permeate the whole system," said Mozzie. "Back in the nineties, the Japanese did some experiments after they had a terrorist attack on their subway. They released harmless powder as a stand-in for chemical weapons. It didn't take long for the particles to make their way from one end of the system to the other. Now, if they released it outside, it would depend on the wind direction, the weather, humidity, time of day." He paused, taking in their intense stares. He spread his hands. "What? Someone had to do the research."

"We have to find the containers," said Peter.

Neal nodded. He scuffed a shoe on the ground. The floor was very clean. An idea was percolating in the back of his brain. Something Mozzie had said.

"How can we do that?" Peter asked.

Silence. "The dog that didn't bark," said Neal.

Peter waited. They all waited.

"In an investigation, it's always the dog that didn't bark," said Neal, snapping his fingers. "Something is there that shouldn't be there, or it should be there, but it isn't. Peter. The Postman's team. His contacts. His workers. They booked out of here with almost no warning. Right? That fire up above was careless. Look at this place. They were in the middle of work."

"I agree," said Peter.

"So what should be here but isn't?"

Nobody said anything.

"Come on, guys." Neal bounced on the balls of his feet. "This was a big job. There was an administrative aspect."

"Papers." It wasn't Peter that spoke up, but Mercy. She stepped forward. "There are no papers."

Neal pointed at her. "At the villa we write on everything," he said. "The walls. I have a stack of legal pads this high. And I'm a lot more careful than the Postman. You too, right?" He looked at Mozzie, who nodded. "Mercy, when you do your work how do you do it?"

"I have—checklists, maps."

"Mozzie and I have maps," said Neal. "Peter? Has White Collar gone paperless in the last three years?"

Peter shook his head. "No way. If anything, it's worse."

"Maps? Casework up on the walls?"

"Yeah," said Peter.

"If you had to leave in the middle of the day, would you be able to clean it up?"

"No."

Neal asked, "Where is the Postman's casework?"

While they looked, Neal thought. The walls were too rough to write or hang things on. But the _floor_ was as smooth as the ice-skating rink in Rock Center. The tables were empty but they had locking wheels. Neal stepped forward and stepped on one of the locks. He did the other three, then pushed a table out of the way. The others got the idea and pushed the rest of the worktables to the edges of the room. The abandoned containers were rolled into corners.

Neal asked, "What do you see?"

"There's nothing there," said Peter.

"No?" Neal took a Swiss Army knife out of his pocket, bent down and scratched the floor. He showed it to Peter, who leaned in to look. There was a soapy residue on the blade. "It was something you said, Moz, that made me think of it. The weather makes a difference because if it's raining outside or if it's really humid..."

Mozzie said, "The particles fall. They don't hang in the air. The wind doesn't carry them. It has to be very dry for the particles to..." His eyes went wide. A smile spread across his face. "Neal."

"This sprinkler system." Neal pointed up. "It's not for fires. It's to keep the room damp. To keep the dust wet so it doesn't float in the air and make the workers sick. _This workshop was wet all the time_."

Mozzie didn't wait for Neal to tell him what to do. He traced the sprinkler system pipes to a handle on the wall. He and Neal exchanged a glance. Neal nodded and Mozzie turned it. He cranked it all the way. A smell of damp and rust filled the room and a few of the sprinkler heads drooled. Lukewarm water dripped on Peter's head. Then the entire system sighed, and a fine mist of water filled the air. They were already sweaty. Being drenched in water hardly made a difference. Neal stepped back and extended his arm to pull Peter and Mercy back with him.

Gradually the cement floor darkened and began to glisten.

But not everywhere.

In places, little spots, the water beaded up.

Mercy's jaw dropped. "Geen manier, swendelaar. How could you know?"

"Graduate studies at the Neal Caffery school for swindlers," said Neal. "Mix deodorant with clear sealer and you have an ink that only appears _when it's_ _wet._ "

On the floor, in invisible ink, was the casework.

On the floor was a schedule.

On the floor was a map.

#

Perhaps no team of four in the world was better suited to breaking down the logistics of transporting contraband. Within ten minutes they were deep into the Postman's system, and soon they were experts in it. In addition to having a devilish intellect, Neal knew almost everything there was to know about crossing borders in a professional way. Mozzie knew the route as only a weary traveler could. Mercy had the extensive local contacts necessary to move illegal materiel out of the Sperrgbiet. Being a person of a Mozzie disposition, she was also in possession of a waterproof world map and a satellite telephone and a ruler and a graphing calculator. And apparently she'd packed light.

A general and a generalist, Peter's job was to heard this team of criminal geniuses and course-correct where he could. As always, he reserved the better half of his attention to watching their backs and anticipating messes, meltdowns and disasters. He had left his shield and service weapon at home and sorely missed them. Neither would be useful here, in the practical sense, but as talismans of safety and accoutrements of his authority, they were essential now.

They were going to find the truck. There was no question about that. Peter hadn't really worried about that since the question of the truck had come up back in Rome. The mystery—and the danger—was what came next. The Postman was dead. The puppet master who was behind all this was in the wind. The chain of evidence that led to him might be falling apart as they worked. This mine would continue to be a danger as long as it was open and unguarded, but Peter had no idea how to deal with that. They were already in international-incident territory—not for the first time! They could be thrown in jail just for being here, and the U.S. government would be no help at all. The State Department expected you not to break laws. The FBI definitely wouldn't spring for a lawyer under these circumstances. And these questions were all subordinate to the larger danger that the dust might reach its destination.

There were three schedules and three routes, which the Postman had rotated among in order to keep the authorities off his trail. There were three destinations as well, which they had talked through before: Los Angeles, D.C. and—

"It's New York," said Neal. "The New York route."

Mozzie sighed. "Of course it's New York."

Mercy took a small black box from her pocket. From it, she pulled out a silver e-cigarette and put it to her lips. The cloud of vapor disappeared into the mist. She was no longer hiding her worries.

"It shouldn't matter," said Neal.

But it did. Peter extended a hand. "Can I have the phone please?"

"Are you going to try D.C. again?" Neal asked.

Mozzie scoffed. "And tell them _what_?" He held an imaginary phone to his ear. "'Dear Super Suits, this is Field Suit. Yeah, the AWOL one, I'm at the bottom of a forbidden mine in Africa with two—'"

"I'm telling my wife to go visit her cousin in Iowa." Peter beckoned.

Mercy looked at each of them in turn. "Is anybody going to say, no, you can't do that, it'll cause a panic?"

Neal shook his head.

Mozzie looked at Neal, then at her. "We're OK with causing a panic."

"Good." Mercy tossed Peter the satellite phone.

#

Twenty minutes later, Mozzie took out his permanent marker and made an x on Mercy's map.

Kneeling on the floor, Neal folded his arms on top of the table and settled his chin on top of his hands to get a closer look. He looked up at his friend. "Philadelphia."

"Nuh-uh," said Mozzie. He put another x on the map. He drew a line between the two and wrote 1 hr. "You're going to York. You'll want to fly into Baltimore, not Philly. It's closer."

"We'll need a car," said Neal.

"I can handle that," said Mozzie. He reached for the phone.

"Don't skimp," Neal warned.

"Please," said Mozzie. "I can shop for a car."

Neal said, "Don't steal it. We can't afford heat."

Mozzie cracked his knuckles. "Watch the master work."

"Mercy," said Neal. "How fast can we get to Baltimore?"

"Have you got your own documents?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Cash?"

"It's safe to say so," Neal assured her.

She curled a lip at that. "With my contacts at Windhoek, I can put you anywhere in the world twenty-three hours, if you don't care where you stop over."

"I don't care." Neal tapped the map. "Get us there."

"Already done," she said.

Looking over their battle plans, Peter's mind rebelled against getting on a plane again. But this time they would be going home. This was the end of the day.

York, Pennsylvania.

That was the furthest south they could meet the truck. While they were flying west, it would be coming up from the southwest. It would be pass through nine states, pausing only for the driver to rest or gas up. Any closer was too close to the city. Any further away and they'd miss it. Twenty-three hours would already shave it pretty close. If they left Windhoek in the next two to three hours they would be hitting the interstate in York within ten minutes of the truck. It would require a ballet dancer's precision and Neal Caffrey's luck. Peter had been on exactly one high-speed chase in his life, when he was a probie. It had been a crazy-dangerous trawl through downtown Manhattan that had totaled three vehicles and left one officer with an arm broken so badly it needed pins. Chasing down a truck with a plane was a different matter.

Nobody had to say anything. There was no time at all to lose. They gathered up their things and stuffed them away in backpacks, in pockets. Neal took one last look at the pulverizing machine. Mozzie turned off the mist. They were all soaked to the skin. They were all quiet. They were all thinking about dust, and New York City, and rain.

Trying to meet the truck was insane. Not trying would be even worse. An FBI agent had warnings about 9/11 that were never heeded. When Peter heard about that, he promised himself nobody would ever find an ignored report in his desk drawer. He would be there. He would be running toward the finish line no matter what anybody said about it. He trusted Neal—oh, he trusted Neal to be himself. Nothing more. Nothing less. But this—what they were doing right now—this was the very best part of Neal Caffrey. He could never be an agent, but he was the best field asset Peter had ever worked with, and that was _because_ his mind was precocious, creative and amoral. Peter was smarter than he looked, and Mozzie was probably _better_ than Neal, in terms of actual, measurable skills.

But neither of them would have looked for invisible ink on the floor.

Outside it was raining, a cool, relentless, monsoon squall that put the sprinkler system to shame. Neal took his hat off and shook it out, pointlessly. Mud was beginning to collect on the dirt paths that spiraled up to the surface. Water pooled at the bottom of the hole. After the silence and heaviness of the mine, the smell of ozone and petrichor were dizzying. Peter's head throbbed.

He looked at Mercy. "You ever been to New York?"

"No, sir. Americans don't like my business. Or my paperwork." She smiled.

"It's my home. My family's home." Peter said, "I'm gonna ask you to fly in this."

She took a drag from her e-cig. Her face lit up briefly blue. She turned her face up to the sky and let the rain fall on it. She took a deep breath. They were out now. Outside was safe. "Oh, liefling," she sighed, as if he were the most foolish summer child who'd ever lived. "Bless."

#

For the flight back to Windhoek, Mozzie sat in the passenger seat beside Mercy, and Peter and Neal sat across from each other, buckled in and feeling like a couple of sardines in water. Peter was weary and cold. The prospect of another day and night on a plane did not make him feel well. Neal was very... fine-tuned. He did not lean out to peer out the window at muddy ghost towns and bottomless pits. He had his hands on his knees and he stared ahead, not at Peter, but at some point in the distance.

It must not be easy, Peter thought. Of course it cost to die. Nobody Peter knew had ever made the return journey before, but that must cost too. After all, the world went on without you in it. It just went on. People got promoted and the problems you were working on, that seemed so important, were resolved or forgotten, and someone moved into the places you used to live, and the children grew and began to speak. And you were still dead.

And sometimes the news hit even closer to home than that. Neal picked up on Peter's staring and refocused, smiling with an air of both charm and resolve. He pointed forward and Peter turned around to look. Mozzie had his nose stuck in his phone. He was in intense concentration, biting his tongue, head cocked like a thoughtful hound as he paged through one article or another. But his other hand rested casually on Mercy's knee. She turned to catch him in the corner of her eye, and caught Peter instead. She pretended she hadn't, but when she turned back she was smiling, her teeth small and white like chiclets. It was the first truly authentic look Peter had seen on her face—not sophisticated at all, or witty, but awkward and slightly goofy.

Peter turned back to Neal, who arched an eyebrow at him: _real thing?_

Because Peter had been married for almost twenty years, the criminal class seemed to think he was some kind of authority on matters of the heart. He wasn't. He had stumbled in to his partnership with Elizabeth innocently, and what made it work was honesty and persistence, which were things any schmuck off the street could do if they cared enough. What Peter did know was that the world could get pretty cold and that tomorrow any one of them could certainly wake up in a radically different situation, or not wake up at all, and there was a truck full of nuclear dust headed to New York. Best-case scenario, their faces were plastered all over CNN tomorrow night as the crack investigators who'd stopped a terrorist attack. He shook his head, not to say no or yes but, _Neal, c'mon, man, give a break—_

Neal hit the button on his headphones. Peter heard a static crackle.

Silence.

"Moz," said Neal. "You're done. You're not coming with us to Baltimore."

Crackle. Silence. Silence. "OK." Mozzie didn't insist. He didn't say, _No way, Neal, I'm definitely coming. Wild horses couldn't stop me_. That's what he'd said the last time they did one of these. Peter looked down at his wingtips. It was always the dog that didn't bark that gave the game away. Maybe they really were in love. Or maybe they were just passing the time. At the end of the day it didn't matter. A feeling was a feeling.

Neal took a deep breath. He drummed his fingers on his knee. "Whatever happens, this is good work, Moz," he said, with rare sincerity. "Maybe our best ever."

"It doesn't end," Mozzie replied. "The work, I mean."

Pause. Crackle. Pause. "I never wanted it to."

Pause. Crackle. Crackle. Nothing.

#

A private jet was waiting for Neal and Peter at the Windhoek airport, ready to whisk them to the nearest big airport: Johannesburg. By the time they stumbled out of the Apache, the sun was out again. They all had the clammy, chafed feeling that came from spending hours in wet clothes.

Two men, one in a pilot's uniform and one in a steward's, met them with little glasses of espresso and suits in garment bags. The urgency if not the nature of their business had been made clear to the crew, and the inspections had been completed, the engines fired, an a feeling of built-up energy surrounded the jet.

"Mercy." Neal pressed a hand to his heart.

"Don't thank me till you find out whether I got your measurements correct." He bit his lip and batted his lashes at her. "Oh, get on, swendelaar," she groused. "You step off that plane and you better step right onto the next one. The pilot will wait, but don't make him." Keeping his hands behind his back, Neal kissed her on the cheek. She narrowed her eyes and smoked suspiciously at him. "You run like your FBI is after you."

Neal didn't say goodbye to Mozzie. They were past that. They nodded at each other. "I guess I'll put the villa on the market," said Mozzie, with a pointed look at Peter.

"No rush," said Peter, without subtext.

"Hey," said Neal. "We might find work in Windhoek this winter."

"Stranger things," Moz agreed.

Mercy crossed her arms. "Stay the hell away from my diamond mines."

"Don't worry about it," said Neal. "I'll get a permit."

"You'd better."

Mozzie said, "Suit, it's been real, and it's been good, but it hasn't been real good." Now that another collaboration was coming to an end, it was time to reestablish boundaries. Mozzie didn't like to feel like a federal asset for long periods of time. He would be upset to find himself listed as a protected criminal informant, so Peter had never told him.

They shook hands. "Next time you find yourself stuck at an international border," said Peter, "call the CIA."

Mozzie gave a magician's bow, with a flourish.

Peter turned his hand it the air. "Hey! Caffrey! Cowboy up."

#

As the jet curled taxied around the runway, Mozzie hooked an arm over Mercy's damp waist. He chewed a nail as the plane trafficked away. She leaned into him and put her head on his shoulder. "Do you think they'll do it?" Mercy asked. "Do you think they can stop it? All on their own?"

"I trust Neal to do the right things," said Mozzie.

"And the FBI?"

Mozzie sighed. "I trust the suit to be the suit."

"And how does he do that?"

"Very carefully." Looking at her, he seemed to slam the yearbook shut. "Italy's wet and cold this time of year."

Mercy pursed her lips. "Sounds delightful."

"It is. We should cut out before international travel is shut down."

"You're that confident, eh? What about my bus—" She stiffened.

"What?"

" _Blow_ me!" Her face flushed with anger, and she kicked the ground. "De blerrie fokken domkop!"

Mozzie was only just learning Afrikaans, but he knew an insult when heard one. Mercy had grown up in Cape Town and could say things about your mother that would make a bald man's hair curl. "What what _what?"_

Mercy held up her bare hand. "The skelm stole my ring!"

The ground shook. The plane loomed, then rushed over their heads. Long gone.


	6. Chapter 6

It ended here, of course.

It was always going to end here. Peter Burke approached it with the resignation of an exhausted man who knows he must ascend a forbidding peak: conserve what's left.

Shepherd your meager resources.

Radiation sickness was a mean, ugly thing. What happened to you—as Peter had learned in excruciating detail—was that your DNA unzipped and disintegrated, causing you to suffer what felt like every illness in the world at once, from the worst flu to the worst headache to the worst stomach bug. Peter had spent twenty-four hours in Bethesda Naval Hospital as sick as he had ever been in his life. It had been harder on Neal. They had put him in a coma for a fortnight and done some kind of weird new chelation procedure on him. Finally off the ventilator, Neal was now in a condition called "guarded but hopeful." When Peter heard this, he thought: well, Christ. That'd been Neal Caffrey's condition since he was four years old.

Peter had been cleared medically over a week ago, but what with the national security crisis and all, he'd been marooned in Bethesda since the event. He could have fought to be sent back to New York, but he couldn't leave Neal defenseless. Mozzie wouldn't come within ten miles of a naval base, and if the Navy wasn't careful, Neal would walk off with the plans for the next missile and a permanent seat on the National Security Council. Assuming he ever woke up. So instead of going home, Peter had his family sent down, and they were all put up in relatively OK officers' housing. It was almost like being on vacation. Peter spent his mornings sleeping in, his afternoons with the scientists, soldiers, doctors and brass, and his evenings sitting in an easy chair in Neal's hospital room reading a book called _Why They Do It: Inside the Mind of the White Collar Criminal._

Compared to the ICU, Neal's recovery room was intensely quiet, without even the comforting blip-blip-blip of a heart monitor. Peter licked a fingertip and turned the page. The words on the page blurred and ran together. He lifted up his reading glasses and rubbed his tired eyes.

An object came sailing over his shoulder and into his lap.

It was a small greasy paper bag with the smiley-face logo of a local fast food restaurant. Willie's Waffles, famous for their honeycrisp chicken, sweet potato waffles and double-roasted Colombian coffee. It was the first meal he'd held down in Bethesda and now it was his favorite. He was going to have withdrawal problems when he made it back to Manhattan. He looked over his shoulder. Elizabeth Burke leaned in the doorway, clutching her own bag of food. "Yes, hello," she said, smiling.

Peter dogeared his book. "Hey, hon."

"Hey, hon." She sat on the foot of Neal's bed and began picking through her meal, nibbling the crisp waffle.

"How's Neal?" he asked, meaning their son.

"Having the time of his life," said Elizabeth. "Saluting everything that moves. How's Neal?" Meaning their friend.

"No change." Peter's smile was a sort of grimace.

Elizabeth bit her lip and nodded. She picked at her chicken. "I'm tired. I want to go home."

"You have no idea," Peter agreed.

"OK," she said, "so when does this stop being a—a short-term situation?"

"Tonight."

"Really."

"He's gonna be fine," said Peter. They both looked at Neal Caffrey's still form like he might rise up like Lazarus at that exact moment. He didn't. Peter was not concerned. "I know him."

He looked, and was, gravely unwell, his face slack, his skin loose and the color of chalk. His breaths were fast and shallow. He'd lost fifteen pounds in the hospital. Before they put him out he'd spent three days with a hundred-and-four degree fever, talking out of his head. But Neal could die right now, and Peter could bury him outside using his own badge as a shovel, and he _still_ wouldn't believe it. He'd never believe it again.

"You still haven't told me what happened," said Elizabeth.

"You know what happened, El."

"I have heard the story," she said, "from two cops, a doctor, and a classified after-action report."

Peter sat up. "Hey, don't tell anyone I gave you that."

She held up a hand. "I haven't heard it from you. It's not Peter Burke official."

Peter chuckled. "What, if it's not 'Peter Burke official,' it didn't happen?"

"You're sitting a naval hospital next to the world's greatest con artist and I think you've retroactively joined the CIA," said Elizabeth. "I'm thinking you may have left a couple of things out of the official report."

"Well, I'm convalescing," said Peter. "I forget things. I'm a mess. It's a human tragedy."

"Mm."

"I'm a hero, you know. They're gonna give me a medal."

"Yeah, you and Captain America."

"Well. Do you have conclusive proof that I'm _not_ an Avenger?"

"Could go either way."

Peter admitted, "I may have left a couple of details out."

She crossed her arms. "You almost died. I moved our family to Maryland. And I bought you waffles."

"They're good details," said Peter.

"They're good waffles. I haven't mentioned that _Neal_ is in our lives again and while I am thrilled, I don't imagine it will make things _less_ chaotic for us."

"It was a VW Beetle," said Peter.

Elizabeth pursed her lips and waited.

"This supercar Mozzie was supposed to get us so we could chase down the nuclear terrorists," said Peter. "Cos of us being—"

"Heroes. I get it," said Elizabeth.

"He told us he could shop for a car," said Peter.

#

Three weeks earlier, Neal Caffrey had stepped off the plane with a worn valet ticket in his hand. What the valet brought back from long-term parking was a '68 VW Beetle, its red color faded to a powdery rouge, rusty handles, and an engine that chugged and sighed like a steam train. It smelled of burning oil.

The two men stared at the vehicle for a minute. Neal sighed. "I did tell him not to steal anything."

"Wait," said Peter. "Are you saying this is Mozzie's _own car?"_

Neal smiled grimly. Then a thought occurred to him and he leaned into the car and popped the trunk, which in the old Beetles was in the front. Neal lifted the hood. They leaned over it like a couple of guys in the shop on a Saturday. The trunk was not empty, but it was hard to say what it was full of: it looked like a bunch of heavy rubber and plastic tubing.

"This an impact buffer," said Peter. He stepped back to look at the bumper. Dings and scratches but also: it wasn't original to the car. He kicked it. It was loose. "Neal, is this a crash car?"

"Draw your own conclusions."

Peter walked around the back. No insurance sticker. "If I run the VIN," said Peter, "I'm going to find about sixty-five accidents and a six-digit insurance nut, aren't I?"

"Why do you think it's stashed in airport parking?" said Neal. "But that's not the point. The point is—" Neal opened the engine compartment. He fiddled with a couple of whirring components and pulled out something that looked like a vacuum filter, but wasn't an essential part on any car Peter had ever worked on. The Beetle choked once, then went VROOM. The unmistakable sound of a V8 engine in tip-top condition. "Rules for working with Moz," said Neal. "Never assume you know what's under the hood. Come on. We have to get on the highway. I'm driving."

"We're going to get pulled over and arrested."

"Come on. Who'd pull this thing over?"

"Me, Neal. I would pull you over."

"Yeah, but you're with me." Neal grinned.

Peter threw up his hands, but he also got in the car. Everything about the Beetle was deceptively old and cheap. The seats were comfortable, heated buckets. The headlights sliced through the early-evening mist. The doors were reinforced steel. When Neal shifted it into first gear it moved like a serpent and purred like a kitten. This was a very high-end rally car dressed down for its working week committing insurance fraud. It suggested that Mozzie, the consummate Manhattanite, had a secret life as a car guy. Then again if you started cataloging these guys' secret lives you'd never finish.

"I feel like if I touch anything the seat's gonna eject," said Peter.

"I'm sure it's perfectly safe," said Neal.

Peter kept his hands in his lap. "I bet it drops tacks."

Neal wagged his eyebrows and gunned the engine.

#

They picked a rest stop at the end of the highway range the Windhoek Brain Trust had calculated back at the mine. Neal pulled the Beetle over on the shoulder. They sipped from Styrofoam cups of tepid coffee. There was a range of about four hours in which the famous truck might appear. If they didn't spot it, their timing was off, which was either a complete disaster or nothing. But their timing wasn't off. Peter scowled at the highway. A dozen vehicles were passing per minute. "There's no way this can possibly work."

"How long did it take you to recognize this as a crash car? Four seconds?" Neal asked.

"That's different," Peter said. "We need to call in more people. You know it takes six people at least to stake out a highway. How many times have we been here? It always goes south if you don't have enough people."

"What do you want to do?" Neal asked. "Park cruisers going both ways and start running plates?"

"Yes," said Peter. "That's what I want to do."

"You don't think that might... tip them off?" said Neal carefully.

"That's not the point."

"What's the point?"

"The point is, Neal, in real life, the fate of the free world doesn't rely on the spotting skills of a couple of guys parked on the shoulder."

"I think you'd be surprised," said Neal. "Don't stare at me."

"Have you thought about what you're going to say when Highway Patrol pulls up and asks us what we're doing here?"

"Please, please help us?" Neal suggested. "Have you thought about what we're going to do when we find this thing?"

"I was thinking about shooting out the tires."

"You didn't bring your gun."

"Yeah, that's fine," said Peter. "What if it crashed?"

Silence. They watched the road.

"It's a problem," said Neal. "Isn't it?"

Peter nodded and rubbed the back of his neck. He was exhausted, the kind of tired that plays tricks on your vision. Night was falling. There was a cold knot in his stomach. He missed his family. He hadn't laid eyes on his boy in more than a week, and thinking of Elizabeth gave him a sour feeling in his mouth. It wasn't a good time.

After twenty minutes Neal got fidgety and his attention wandered. He was not suited to this work. This was one of the aspects of their partnership where their skills, psychology and orientation differed so drastically that they could barely work together. Patience was not one of Neal's virtues. Peter caught himself wishing Neal would just drift off so that his own attention wasn't divided between the road and Caffrey's own frenetic tension. Talking to him made it worse.

Then after an hour or so Neal jumped like he'd been bitten, slammed his fist against the steering wheel and spoke a word not suitable for a family paper. Peter had let his mind settle into an easy stake-out rhythm and this sudden cacophony scared the hell out of him and tore his attention from the road. He glanced at Neal once—his face was chalk-white and he was shaking the pain out of his fingers—before zooming back in on the traffic. It was the worst possible light out there. Too bright for headlights, too dark to make out details. They couldn't afford this right now. A second of inattention could cost them everything.

"Tell me," said Peter.

"Hold on."

"Neal, for God's sake—"

But Peter was talking to the empty air. Neal had slipped out of the driver's seat, leaving the keys behind. Peter stared out at the road. A dozen vehicles a minute. About a quarter of them small trucks like the one Mozzie had crossed the border in. He had no license plate number. Neal had taken off. Peter stared out at the highway for a moment longer while his hands clenched into fists. Then he bit his lip and got out of the car and turned his back on the road. The complex behind them was a busy highway rest stop, almost as big as a strip mall. Gas. Restrooms. A small parking lot. Several fast food places. Showers. A place to park your truck overnight. Fast enough when he wanted to be, Neal had already made it across the grassy median to the parking lot. While Peter watched, Neal climbed up onto the top of an eighteen-wheeler and scanned the lot. Peter's head was filled with visions of the truck passing right by them on the road. But he realized what had gotten to Neal: they hadn't been watching the rest stop behind them.

Idiots!

This is why they needed more people.

Peter took out his phone and tried to call Neal. The conman didn't answer, though he did touch his pocket and glance over his shoulder. As if prompted by the buzz of his phone, Neal hopped off the eighteen-wheeler and jogged into the complex. Peter waited for a beat and then began to follow. He had nearly crossed the median when a box truck whipped by him. It was an anonymous off-white box truck with Texas plates. And clinging to the back, pulling on the lock bar, was Neal Caffrey.

The truck was plowing down the merge lane, gaining speed with every second. Neal pulled open the door and slipped inside. Neal pointed at Peter as the truck put distance between them. Then he pulled on the heavy door and shut himself inside.

Oh God.

"Probable cause," Peter muttered to himself. It was like they had never stopped working together. He was giving Peter probable cause to collar the truck. Whatever happened now, Neal was caught up in it for sure.

Peter's phone was still in his hand. As he ran toward the souped-up Beetle, Peter dialed 911.

#

Kzzzt! Kzzzt!

So, here he was. Neal put his hand over his burner phone. The ringer was off, of course, but the vibrator was ridiculously loud and Peter was calling him approximately every fourteen seconds.

Like he needed an update.

The inside of the truck was dark, warm and stifling. He was surrounded by film canisters, marked off with a dozen warnings. His feet slipped on the metal floor. Fine Italian leather shoes were not made for chasing down nuclear terrorists. A single tiny window looked into the driver's seat. The truck driver was a Hispanic man who likely had no clue what he was carrying—but then again, maybe he did. Neal only knew that he had to stop the truck in an orderly way and that no price was too high to do that. There was no upside, no trick, no special secret way out. Neal thought it was very likely that he had seen his last sunset, had his last—and unexpected—laughs with the guys, kissed a girl for the last time. He knew he was already living on borrowed time. He should have been dead ten years ago. He knew he was smart, fast, and lucky, but not this smart. Not this fast.

Not this lucky.

So screw it then. If you knew you were definitely going to die, probably horribly, there was no point in playing by any sort of rules. Neal took his lockpick set out of his secret pocket. The canisters were unbearably heavy. One of the indicators that this was _the_ truck was the groaning way it sat on its shocks.

Difficult to move, they were not, however, hard to open.

Inside the rest stop, Neal had soaked a few towels with water, and now he covered his mouth and nose with one. He used the tiny knife from his kit to cut the seal around the top of the canister. Then he twisted it open and lifted it carefully off. The golden powder inside was finer than baby powder and he knew that the gentle motion of the truck, combined with the still, thick air, would begin to lift it out of the canister. It would hang suspended in the air. Neal clamped the damp towel over his face—for all the good that would do—and used the metal lid to smash the window.

The driver slammed the brakes. Neal felt it under his feet as they pulled off the road and slowed to a stop. The open canister rocked a little. The driver turned an aimed a gun directly in Neal's face. He the whites all the way around the driver's eyes. The fear they both felt.

The driver knew.

So screw him too, thought Neal. We'll all go together when we go. "Hey," he said, "there are only two choices now." Neal's throat was already sore and scratchy. "We wait here and maybe they can help us. Maybe." Neal coughed. His eyes were watering. "Maybe we get clean. Think about it. You wait here with me, and maybe they can save us. Or you can run. That's it. We're done." Neal sat down and hugged his knees. The truck was stopped. Two choices.

No.

There were three. Three choices.

Neal didn't move when he heard the gunshot. He didn't like the sight of blood and he had the sinking feeling that he would be seeing more than enough of his own before long. There were tiny flickers of light at his temples. It seemed like he sat there still as stone for a million years before the truck's door cracked open. The distance to the door seemed impossibly, painfully far. The distance across a desert.

It wasn't a nuclear radiation guy in a Hazmat suit. It was just Peter Burke.

"Shut the door," said Neal. "Get out of here."

Peter strode into the truck and grabbed Neal by the collar and pulled him out of the truck. It had turned into night outside. The truck had plowed about three hundred feet into a wheat field. There was no traffic. The road had been closed. Peter closed the door of the truck tightly behind them and sealed it. Hardly safe. They staggered together to the side of the road where Peter had parked Mozzie's Beetled with its emergency lights flaring.

"That was stupid, Peter," said Neal. "You contaminated yourself."

Peter did not look happy, but he looked calm and determined. "I did that a long time ago."

They could see the cars approaching. Not police cruisers. A hazmat team. An ambulance.

"Don't run," said Peter gently, knowing Neal's instinctive response to flashing lights, the collision of old and new identities, the horrible feeling of the noose closing. Neal shook his head. He couldn't run if he wanted to, and he didn't want to. He staggered and got down on his knees. He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. His stomach churned and stirred. Peter rested a heavy hand on his shoulder.

He was so tired. His eyes ached. His mouth tasted of metal.

"It's OK," Peter's voice echoed in his ear, fuzzing out the sound of sirens, the churning noise of an approaching helicopter. "You're fine."

He was fine. He was completely fine. He slept.

#

It took a minute for Neal to realize that the lump at the foot of his hospital bed was a child. It was a small boy, just beyond toddlerhood, in that state of sleep so deep that it seemed to represent some other plane of reality. He had full red cheeks and longish straw-colored hair. Peter's jawline. Elizabeth's mouth. He was covered up in a fuzzy blue blanket with stars on it. It made Neal think of Vermeer. That kind of fragile luminescence. He was in a lot of pain. They gave him a clicker that controlled his morphine and he clicked it a couple of times. He saw white stars and said, "Wow."

"Whoa, pace yourself, kid." Peter Burke took the button from his hand. "Four drink limit."

Neal swallowed a few times. He wasn't in pain anymore but now his tongue was sticking to the roof of his mouth. "Why? I'm not driving." He blinked a few times. "I thought I heard Elizabeth."

"Couple of hours ago," said Peter.

"Tell her I said hi," said Neal.

"She says hi," Peter replied. "How you doin'? It was touch and go for a few days."

Neal turned his head. Peter sat in a tired-looking vinyl chair with his feet up on Neal's bed. He was looking rumpled in shirtsleeves and a five-o-clock shadow. Behind him was a picture window with vertical blinds, and through them shone a full moon. The room was bathed in bluish light. The last time Neal had seen the moon, over the cornfield, it had been a quarter moon. It had been a bit more than two weeks. So touch and go was an understatement. He did _feel_ like he had been killed. He probably deserved that though. He put everybody else through a lot. He made the effort to lift his hand. A red band was tight around his wrist and the name on it red _Ben Keel_. A few lines underneath: _flight risk._ Well that was true. He thought, hunh.

"Neal."

Neal blinked. "Heya, Peter."

"Need some help?"

Neal coughed painfully. "I'm fine. Never better. I don't need anything." Neal pushed himself up on his elbows and adjusted the pillows. He took a deep breath. Steadied himself. Got ready. "How'd we do? Did we stop it?"

"Of course we stopped it," said Peter. "You did good, Neal."

Neal fingered his hospital band. "They get the buyer?"

"No," said Peter. "But they will. Don't worry about that."

"And what about me?" said Neal.

Peter steepled his fingers over his lips. Then he dropped his feet to the floor and stood. He stretched in a way that made Neal feel jealous, since he didn't think he'd be that steady on his feet for a while. The memories of his radiation sickness were coming back and they made him feel like his shoulders were nailed to the bed.

Peter put his hands on his hips. "Neal, I've been sitting here and I've had a lot of time to think about that. And what I've been thinking about is—" He shook his head. "You know when I was flying to Italy with Mozzie I thought, this is what it means to be corrupt. I lied. I used FBI resources. I left my job. And I didn't feel bad about it."

"Peter."

"Because if I hadn't done that," said Peter. "Then what?" He looked down at his tiny son and sighed. "Caffrey, I'm done trying change you or—or save you. I give up. You are what you are and Christ knows I can't stop you. And if I can't, then it's a lost cause. Cause I'm the only person you've ever listened to." A hint of exasperation and defeat in his voice. "So here's what's going to happen: nothing. You get better. You do your physical therapy. You take some pills. You go home, wherever the hell that is and whatever the hell you do there. I'm giving you your freedom. Real freedom. The kind you don't have to run from. You can even keep the villa. Congratulations."

"I don't get it," said Neal. "Are you _angry_ with me?"

"No," said Peter. "Never again. I'm telling you I understand. Intent matters. Your intent. Neal, you have gifts I don't have. Maybe nobody has. The things you see... and I understand that it means there's a deeper context that just escapes you. So let's talk about what my demands are."

"Demands?" Neal chuffed.

"I'm giving you your identity back," said Peter. "You don't have to use it. But it will be there when you need it. Don't destroy it again." What Neal didn't know then—though he found out later—was that Peter had restored his identity eighteen months ago. He had pulled the same okeydoke with Neal's legal name and documents that had followed Neal around since he was a kid in Witness Protection. Peter had established that Neal was an FBI asset under deep cover. That meant Neal would always have access to the FBI's resources. There was a fire alarm that he could pull.

The real gift Peter was giving him ran deeper than that, though. It gave Neal a mooring. He was still alive. He was still himself. Neal nodded. Something settled inside him that he'd been holding on to for three years. He hadn't liked being a dead man. "Fine."

"Two, don't disappear on us. Me, Elizabeth, Mozzie. Running from us is always a mistake. It doesn't protect anybody. Talking to us is always safer. I don't care what it is."

"OK," said Neal, and he realized his eyes were watering. "What else?"

Peter spotted it, of course. He didn't comment on it. He didn't have to. "That's it."

"That's it?"

"Well. This nuclear thing has a lid on it. You'll have to sign some documents."

"OK," said Neal.

"And the President wants to give you a medal. Unfortunately, that's classified too."

"It's fine," said Neal. "I'll just make my own."

It wasn't that funny, but they both snickered till their sides hurt. Neal coughed up half his lungs, but even though it hurt, he didn't feel bad. He felt buoyant. OK, he was stoned out of his gourd, but there were things he carried with him that drugs couldn't touch. He'd never let himself imagine that he could be both things, do both things. Cop and criminal. Conman and spy. For a man who had founded his entire life on transformation, stability felt like a radical invention. Something new.

"I need coffee," said Peter, when he caught his breath. "You want some coffee?"

The way his throat was feeling, a few ice chips were more his speed. "No," he said. "I'm good."

#

Peter was gone for a long time—or it felt like a long time. Neal wanted to sleep again but Peter had left his little boy here. Little Neal Burke. The namesake. Peter's chance to do it again the right way.

Neal hadn't spent a whole lot of time around kids and wasn't sure what the rules were about really little ones and supervision and sleeping and so on. Parenting was not something Neal Caffrey saw in his future. Maybe. A long time ago. Not now. Peter's could raise a child to be good. For Neal, there would always be an element of performance in it. It wasn't enough.

Neal waited long enough that his eyelids felt heavy and his breaths synced with the child's. He realized he was losing focus and pushed himself up again.

That was how he realized little Neal wasn't the only thing his handler had left in Neal's care. Sitting on the bedside table was a thin blue file marked SECRET. In Neal Caffrey's experience, these kinds of cautions did not apply to him. He was very functional on the subject of secret government files. He opened the file and flipped through it. He tipped it into the light. Something something arson at an FBI safe house. Something something Russian arms dealers.

Something something target Theodore Winters. Mozzie.

The printer.

"Moz." Neal sighed. "What did you do?"

This was going to be a job. He reached up and turned on the overhead light.

At Neal's his feet the little boy stirred. Neal looked over the edge of the file at him. The boy cooed, rolled over and soothed the air with soft snoring. Neal could not remember ever sleeping so fearlessly. Neal coughed into the crook of his arm. Then he licked his fingertips, turned a page, and began to read.

###


End file.
